Free-Thinking, 19th-Century Style

Francis Ellingwood Abbot (1836–1903) was nothing if not determined. In 1872, as editor of The Index, the nation’s leading free-thought magazine, he began to muster the full force of his small army of subscribers against what was being called “the God-in-the-Constitution amendment.” A philosopher and theologian, he sought to reconstruct theology in accordance with scientific methodology. From the...
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A Philadelphia Family at the “Centre of the Universe”

For forty years after the Civil War, a Victorian home on South 21st Street in Philadelphia was con­sidered “The Centre of the Universe” by its promin­ent residents and their visitors. American writers and actors were drawn to this cultural center by the talented parents of Richard Harding Davis, the flamboyant archetype war correspondent who thrilled readers at the turn of the...
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