Fanny Crosby
Encyclopedia
Frances Jane Crosby usually known as Fanny Crosby in the United States and by her married name, Frances van Alstyne, in the United Kingdom, was an American Methodist
rescue mission worker, poet, lyricist, and composer. During her lifetime, she was well-known throughout the United States. By the end of the 19th century, she was "a household name in evangelical Protestant circles" globally, and "one of the most prominent figures in American evangelical life". She became blind as a child.
Best known for her Protestant Christian hymn
s and gospel songs, Crosby was "the premier hymnist of the gospel song period (ca. 1870-1920)", and one of the most prolific hymnists in history, writing over 8000, with over 100 million copies of her songs printed. Crosby was inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame
in 1975. Known as the "Queen of Gospel Song Writers", and as the "Mother of modern congregational singing in America",
with "dozens of her hymns continue to find a place in the hymnals of Protestant evangelicalism around the world", with most American hymnal
s containing her work, as "with the possible exception of Isaac Watts and Charles Wesley, Crosby has generally been represented by the largest number of hymns of any writer of the twentieth century in nonliturgical hymnals". Her gospel songs were "paradigmatic of all revival music", and Ira Sankey attributed the success of the Moody and Sankey
evangelical campaigns largely to Crosby's hymns. Some of Crosby's best-known songs include "Blessed Assurance
", "Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
", "Jesus Is Tenderly Calling You Home", "Praise Him, Praise Him", "Rescue the Perishing", and "To God Be the Glory
". Because some publishers were hesitant to have so many hymns by one person in their hymnals, Crosby used nearly 200 different pseudonym
s during her career.
Crosby wrote over 1,000 secular poems, and had four books of poetry published, as well as two best-selling autobiographies. Crosby was the subject of at least a dozen biographies. Additionally, Crosby co-wrote popular secular songs, as well as political and patriotic songs, and at least five cantata
s on biblical and patriotic themes, including The Flower Queen, the first secular cantata by an American composer. Crosby was committed to Christian rescue missions, and was known for her public speaking.
, about fifty miles north of New York City. She was the only child of John Crosby, a widower who had a daughter from his first marriage, and his second wife, Mercy Crosby, both of whom were relatives of Revolutionary War spy Enoch Crosby
. According to C. Bernard Ruffin
, John and Mercy were possibly first cousins, however "by the time Fanny Crosby came to write her memoirs [in 1906], the fact that her mother and father were related ... had become a source of embarrassment, and she maintained that she did not know anything about his lineage".
Crosby was proud of her Puritan
heritage, and said in 1903: "My ancestors were Puritans; my family tree rooted around Plymouth Rock". Crosby traced her ancestry from Ann Brigham and Simon Crosby who arrived in Boston in 1635, and was one of the founders of Harvard College
, whose descendants later married into Mayflower families
, making Crosby a descendant of Elder William Brewster
, Edward Winslow
, and Thomas Prence
, and later a member of the exclusive Daughters of the Mayflower. Crosby was also later a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution
in Bridgeport, Connecticut
, writing the verses of the state song of the Connecticut branch.
Through Simon Crosby, Fanny was also a relative of Presbyterian minister Howard Crosby and his son, neoabolitionist Ernest Howard Crosby
, as well as singers Bing Crosby
and his brother, Bob
.
s were applied to treat the discharges. According to Crosby, this procedure damaged her optic nerve
s and blinded her. Many physicians today, however, "suggest it is much more likely that her blindness was congenital", and that "at such an early age her sightless condition may well have escaped her parents".
Her father died in November 1820, and Crosby was then raised by her mother and maternal grandmother, Eunice.
, where Eunice had been raised. While residing in North Salem, the Crosbys attended the Peach Pond Society of Friends meetinghouse near Peach Lake
.
In April 1825 Crosby was examined by Valentine Mott
, who Neptune has called "America's premier surgeon". He concluded that Crosby's condition was inoperable and that her blindness was permanent.
At the age of eight Crosby wrote her first poem, which described her condition:
Crosby later remarked: "It seemed intended by the blessed providence of God that I should be blind all my life, and I thank him for the dispensation. If perfect earthly sight were offered me tomorrow I would not accept it. I might not have sung hymns to the praise of God if I had been distracted by the beautiful and interesting things about me." Crosby also once said, "when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior". When asked about her blindness, Crosby was reported as saying that "had it not been for her affliction she might not have so good an education or have so great an influence, and certainly not so fine a memory".
. Crosby's mother worked as household servant. While residing in Ridgefield, they attended the Presbyterian church on the Village Green.
Crosby's mother and grandmother grounded Crosby in Protestant Christian principles, helping her, for example, memorize long passages from the Bible. Historian Edith L. Blumhofer described the Crosby home environment as sustained by "an abiding Christian faith".
With the encouragement of her grandmother, and later Mrs. Hawley, from the age of ten, Crosby had memorized five chapters of the Bible each week, until by the age of fifteen Crosby had memorized the four gospels, the Pentateuch, the Book of Proverbs
, the Song of Solomon
, and many of the Psalms
.
From 1832, a music teacher came to Ridgefield twice a week to give singing lessons to Crosby and some of the other children. Around the same time, Crosby attended her first Methodist church services at the Methodist Episcopal Church where she was delighted by their hymns.
(NYIB), a state-financed asylum. She remained there for eight years as a student, and another two years as a graduate pupil, during which she learned to play the piano, organ, harp, and guitar, and became a good soprano singer.
In 1838, her mother Mercy Crosby remarried and the couple had three children together. Morris abandoned his wife in 1844.
in Washington, D.C.
arguing for support of education for the blind. Crosby was the first woman to speak in the United States Senate
when she read a poem there. When Crosby appeared before a joint sitting of both houses of the United States Congress
, she recited these lines:
On January 24, 1844, Crosby was one of seventeen students from the NYIB who gave a concert for Congress, and she recited a thirteen stanza original composition that called for the creation of an institution for the education of the blind in every state. This "drew calls for an encore", and earned the congratulations of John Quincy Adams
. On January 29, 1844 Crosby and nineteen other Blind Institution students gave a presentation to Daniel Haines
, the governor; and the council and New Jersey General Assembly
at Trenton, New Jersey, where she recited a twelve-stanza original poem calling for the aid and education of the blind.
When President James K. Polk
visited the NYIB in 1845, Crosby recited a poem she composed for the occasion that praised "republican government".
In April 1846, Crosby spoke before a joint session of the United States Congress, with delegations from the Boston and Philadelphia Institutions for the Blind, "to advocate support for the education of the blind in Boston, Philadelphia, and New York". She also testified before a special congressional subcommittee, and sang a song she composed in the music room at the White House
for Polk and his wife. Among the songs she sang as she accompanied herself on the piano was her own composition:
While teaching at the NYIB, Crosby studied music under George F. Root, until his resignation in November 1850. In 1851 Crosby addressed the New York state legislature.
While teaching at the NYIB Crosby befriended future US president Grover Cleveland
then aged 17. Cleveland and Crosby spent many hours together at the end of each day, and Cleveland often transcibed the poems Crosby dictated to him. Cleveland wrote a recommendation for Crosby which was published in her 1906 autobiography. Being unable to attend due to her health, Crosby wrote a poem that was read at the dedication of Cleveland's birthplace in Caldwell, New Jersey
in March 1913.
, Presbyterian, Congregationalist, and Methodist. From 1839 Crosby usually attended church services and class meetings, at the Eighteenth Street Methodist Episcopal Church (established in 1835) at 305-307 West 18th Street, in what is now the Chelsea district of New York City
.
Later Crosby's understanding of the Christian faith could be described as "rooted in Puritanism, developed by Methodism, warmed by the Holiness movement
, and nourished by her Congregationalism
".
epidemic in New York City. Crosby remained at the NYIB to nurse the sick, rather than leaving the city. Subsequently, according to Blumhofer, "Crosby seemed worn, languid, even depressed" when the Institution re-opened in November, forcing her to teach a lighter load. According to Bernard Ruffin
:
again and knelt at the "anxious seat
" at the front of the church sanctuary, and sought an assurance of her salvation.
Crosby later testified: "My very soul was flooded with celestial light. I sprang to my feet, shouting 'Hallelujah'". She described this "November Experience" as "a watershed of sorts in her life". However, Crosby acknowledged that there "was no sudden or dramatic change in her way of life", writing: "My growth in grace was very slow, from the beginning".
in Brooklyn Heights, New York pastored since 1847 by Congregationalist abolitionist
Henry Ward Beecher
who was acclaimed as a "prince of the pulpit" but was also an innovator with church music. She also attended the Fourth Avenue Presbyterian Church, pastored by her distant cousin Howard Crosby, and the Trinity Episcopal church. Crosby also liked to worship at the North West Dutch Reformed church
and the Central Presbyterian Church (later known as the Brooklyn Tabernacle).
In later life Crosby nominated Theodore Ledyard Cuyler
, who pastored the North East Dutch Reformed Church
as one of her favorite preachers.
While tradition insists Crosby was a member "in good standing" of the John Street
Methodist Episcopal Church
in New York City, there are no contemporaneous records to confirm this. By 1869 Crosby attended the Chelsea Methodist Episcopal Church.
of the second half of the 19th century, and despite having left no record of an experience of entire sanctification, Crosby was a fellow traveler of the Wesleyan holiness movement, including in her circle of friends prominent members of the American Holiness movement and attending Wesleyan/Holiness camp meeting
s. For example, Crosby was a friend of Walter and Phoebe Palmer
, "the mother of the holiness movement", and "arguably the most influential female theologian in Christian history", and their daughter Phoebe Knapp
, with whom she wrote "Blessed Assurance
", often visiting the Methodist camp grounds at Ocean Grove, New Jersey
, as their guest. For many years (from at least 1877 until at least 1897), Crosby vacationed each summer at Ocean Grove, where she would speak in the Great Auditorium and hold receptions in her cottage to meet her admirers.
In 1877 Crosby met William J. Kirkpatrick
, one of the most prolific composers of gospel song tunes, and "the most prominent publisher in the Wesleyan/Holiness Movement", whom she called "Kirkie", with whom she wrote many hymns. Some of her hymns reflected her Wesleyan beliefs, including her call to consecrated Christian living in "I Am Thine, O Lord" (1875):
In spring 1887 Crosby joined by "confession of faith" the Cornell Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church.
.
After some temporary opposition by the faculty of the Blind Institution, Crosby's inclination to versify was encouraged after she was examined by George Combe
, a visiting Scottish phrenologist
, who pronounced her a "born poetess". The Institution found Hamilton Murray, who admitted his own inability to compose poetry, to teach her poetic composition.
In 1841 New York Herald
published Crosby's eulogistic
poem on the death of President William Henry Harrison
, thus beginning her literary career. Crosby's poems were published frequently in The Saturday Evening Post
, the Clinton Signal, and the Fireman's Journal, and the Saturday Emporium.
Despite a serious illness that resulted in her leaving the Blind Institution to recuperate, Crosby's first published book, A Blind Girl and Other Poems, was published after encouragement by the Blind Institution in April 1844 by Putnam & Wiley. It contained 78 of her original poems and addresses, including what Crosby describes as her first published hymn, "An Evening Hymn", based on Psalm 4:8.
While Crosby was reluctant to have her poems published, as she considered them to be "unfinished productions", she acquiesced eventually as it would both publicise the Institution and raise funds for it.
In 1853 Crosby's Monterey and Other Poems, containing 101 poems and addresses was published by R. Craighead of New York City, because of her "sadly impaired health, and a frequent inability to discharge those duties from which I hitherto derived a maintenance", and the hope that "the Blind Girl's declining years be thereby rendered unclouded by that dependency so repulsive", and who was "ever assiduous for her self-support". In her 1903 autobiography edited by Will Carleton
, Crosby indicates that at this time: "I was under a feeling of sadness and depression at this time". It included poems focusing on the recent Mexican-American War, and a poem pleading for the USA to help those affected by the Irish Potato Famine.
In 1853 Crosby's poem "The Blind Orphan Girl" was included in Caroline M. Sawyer's The History of the Blind Vocalists.
About the time Crosby resigned from the Blind Institution and was married, in 1858, her third book, A Wreath of Columbia's Flowers, containing four short stories and 30 poems was published.
, between August 1851 and 1857 Crosby and George F. Root, who had taught music at the Blind Institution from 1845 to 1850, wrote at least sixty secular "people's songs" or parlour songs
, some for the popular minstrel show
s. Due to the negative reputation of the minstrel shows among some Christians and classical musicians, both Root's and Crosby's participation in these compositions was deliberately obscured. According to Ruffin, "Like many cultured people of the day, [Root] considered native American music rather crude", and like many American artists and musicians of that era, chose to "Europeanize" his name, choosing to use the name George Friederich Wurzel (German for Root), while Crosby's name was sometimes omitted altogether. For many years Crosby was usually paid only $1 or $2 per poem with all rights to the song being retained by the composer or publisher of the music.
In the summer of 1851 George Root and Crosby both taught at the North Reading Musical Institute in North Reading Massachusetts
. Crosby and Root's first song was "Fare Thee Well, Kitty Dear" (1851), a song that endeavored to evoke "Old-South imagery", with Crosby's lyrics based on a suggestion by Root, which Crosby described as "the grief of a colored man on the death of his beloved", and was written for and performed exclusively by Henry Wood's Minstrels. Published by John Andrews, who specialized in printing "Neat, quick & cheap", according to Karen Linn, "this song was not a hit, and had no lasting influence", as "its style is far too literary, the words not in dialect, the cause of sorrow seems to be a lover (rather than 'massa', or Little Eva, or homesickness: all more appropriate causes for slave sorrow according to the popular culture)". In 1852 Root signed a three-year contract with William Hall & Son.
Despite this initial setback, during her vacations in 1852 and 1853, Crosby continued to teach at North Reading, where she wrote the lyrics for many of her collaborations with Root. Among their joint compositions was "Bird of the North" (1852); and "Mother, Sweet Mother, Why Linger Away?" (1852).
Crosby and Root's first successful popular songs was "The Hazel Dell" (1853), a "sentimental ballad" described by its publisher as "a very pretty and easy song, containing the elements of great popularity", which was released as the work of G.F. Wurzel toward the end of 1853, and was a hit, that was "one of the most popular songs in the country", because of its performance by both Henry Wood's Minstrels and Christy's Minstrels
, selling more than 200,000 copies of sheet music
,. It is described as being on "the fringes of blackface minstrelsy, although it lacks dialect or any hint of buffoonery", was about a beautiful girl who died young:
In December 1854 in an article proclaiming the death of "Negro minstrelsy", the "Hazel Dell", along with Stephen C. Foster's 1851 song "Old Folks at Home
" and "My Old Kentucky Home
" (1853), were mentioned as popular songs that were evidence of the "bleaching process, ... observable in the gradual rejection of the plantation, and the adoption of sentiments and poetic forms of expression, characteristic rather of the intelligent Caucasian".
Toward the end of 1853, William Hall & Son released "Greenwood Bell", at the same time as "Hazel Dell", but credited it to Root and Crosby. It describes the funeral of a child, a young man, and an aged person, and the tolling of the bell at the Greenwood Cemetery
. Other songs written by Crosby and Root included "O How Glad to Get Home"; "They Have Sold Me Down the River (The Negro Father's Lament)" (1853); Their song "There's Music in the Air" (1854) became a "hit song", and was listed in Variety Music Cavalcade as one of the most popular songs of 1854, and was in songbooks until at least the 1930s, becoming a college song at Princeton University
.
After the expiration of Root's contract with William Hall & Son in 1855, Crosby-Root songs were published by other publishers, including Six Songs by Wurzel published in 1855 by S. Brainard's Sons of Cleveland, Ohio, after being rejected by Nathan Richardson of Russell & Richardson of Boston. These six Root-Crosby songs were "O How Glad to Get Home"; "Honeysuckle Glen"; "The Church in the Wood"; "All Together Now"; and "Proud World, Good-by". The most popular of these songs was "Rosalie, the Prairie Flower",
about the death of a young girl, popularized in the 1850s by the Christy Minstrels, which sold more than 125,000 copies of sheet music
that earned nearly $3000 in royalties
for Root, and almost nothing for Crosby, after they failed to sell it originally for $100 to Richardson;
Crosby also wrote the words for popular songs for other composers, including "There is a Bright and Sunny Spot" (1856) for Clare W. Beames.
s of three cantata
s for Root. Their first cantata was The Flower Queen; The Coronation of the Rose, (1852), often described as "the first secular cantata written by an American", an opera "in all but name", described as a "popular operetta
", which "illustrated nineteenth-century American romanticism". In her 1906 autobiography Crosby explained the theme of this cantata:
Written as "a work for teenage girls (scored for first and second soprano
and alto
)", The Flower Queen was performed first on March 11, 1853 by the young ladies of Jacob Abbott's Springer Institute, and almost immediately repeated by Root's students at the Rutgers Female Institute, and was praised by R. Storrs Willis. It was subsequently performed an estimated 1,000 times throughout the United States in the first four years after its publication. The success of The Flower Queen and subsequent cantatas, brought great acclaim and fortune to Root, with little of either for Crosby.
The second Root-Crosby cantata was Daniel, or the Captivity and Restoration, based on the Old Testament story of Daniel
, that was composed in 1853 for Root's choir at the Mercer Street Presbyterian Church in Manhattan. This cantata comprised 35 songs, with music composed with William Batchelder Bradbury
, and words by Union Theological Seminary
student Chauncey Marvin Cady
and Crosby; Some of its principal choruses were first performed on July 15, 1853 by the students at Root's New-York Normal Institute.
In 1854 Root and Crosby collaborated to compose The Pilgrim Fathers, with Lowell Mason
assisting with the music. Described as an "antebellum landmark" in dramatic cantatas, The Pilgrim Fathers, which "featured the contemporary evangelical reading of American history", was published by Oliver Ditson & Company of Boston, and released by Mason Brothers by August 1854.
Crosby wrote the libretto for a cantata entitled, The Excursion, with Baptist music professor Theodore Edson Perkins, one of the founders of New York music publishing house Brown & Perkins, writing the music. In 1886 Crosby and William Howard Doane wrote Santa Claus' Home; or, The Christmas Excursion, a Christmas cantata, published by Biglow & Main.
. By the 1840 US Presidential election
, Crosby was "an ardent Democrat" and wrote verse against the Whig candidate (and ultimate winner), William Henry Harrison
. By 1852 Crosby switched her political allegiance from support for the Jacksonian Democrats
to the anti-slavery
Whigs
, writing the poem "Carry Me On" for the Whigs in 1852. After the election of Democrat Franklin Pierce
as US President in November 1856, she wrote:
A "strict abolitionist", Crosby suppported Abraham Lincoln
and the newly-created Republican Party
. After the Civil War, Crosby was a devoted supporter of the Grand Army of the Republic
and its political aims.
broke out, she often pinned the Union flag to her blouse. When a southern lady found this offensive and snapped, 'Take that dirty rag away from here!' Fanny was incensed and told the woman to 'Repeat that remark at your risk!' The restaurant manager arrived on the scene just in time to prevent the two women from coming to blows".
During the American Civil War, Crosby "vented patriotism in verse", and it "evoked from Crosby an outpouring of songs -- some haunting, some mournful, some militaristic, a few even gory", but "her texts testified to her clear moral sense about the issues that fomented in the war years". Crosby wrote many poems supporting the Union cause
, including "Dixie for the Union" (1861), a poem written before the outbreak of hostilities to the tune of Dixie
, a tune adopted later by the Confederate States of America
as a patriotic anthem. The first of the five stanza
s is:
Soon after they met in February 1864, Crosby wrote the words and William B. Bradbury composed the music for a popular patriotic Civil War song "There is a Sound Among the Forest Trees". Crosby's text encourages volunteers to join the Union forces and incorporates references to the past of the United States including the Pilgrim Fathers and the Battle of Bunker Hill
.
Also during the American Civil War, Crosby wrote "Song to Jeff Davis", directed at Jefferson Davis
, the president of the Confederate States of America, which expressed her belief in the morality of the Union cause: "Our stars and stripes are waving, And Heav'n will speed our cause". Crosby also wrote "Good-By, Old Arm", a tribute to wounded soldiers with music by Philip Philips; "Our Country"; and "A Tribute (to the memory of our dead heroes)".
As late as September 1908, Crosby wrote patriotic poems for the Daughters of the American Revolution
, including "The State We Honor", that extolled the virtues of her adopted state of Connecticut.
In 1859 the Van Alstynes had one daughter, Frances, who died in her sleep soon after birth. While some believe the cause was typhoid fever
, Darlene Neptune speculates that it was SIDS
, and that Crosby's hymn, "Safe in the Arms of Jesus" was inspired by her daughter's death.
After the death of their daughter, Van became increasingly reclusive, and Crosby never spoke publicly about being a mother, only mentioning it in a few interviews toward the end of her life, when she said: "Now I am going to tell you of something that only my closest friends know. I became a mother and knew a mother's love. God gave us a tender babe but the angels came down and took our infant up to God and to His throne".
After the death of their daughter, later in 1859 the Van Alstynes moved frequently, "establishing a pattern that continued for the rest of their lives", and never owned their own home, living in rented accommodation without a lease.
In addition to Crosby's income as a poet and lyricist, Van played the organ at two churches in New York city, and gave private music lessons. Although Crosby and Van could have lived comfortably on their combined income, Crosby "had other priorities and gave away anything that was not necessary to their daily survival". Crosby and Van also organized concerts, with half the proceeds given to aid the poor, in which Crosby gave recitations of her poems and sang and Van Alstyne played various instruments. While Van Alstyne provided the music for some of her poetry, Crosby indicated that "his taste was mostly for the wordless melodies of the classics". The Van Alstynes collaborated on the production of a hymnal featuring only hymns written by them, but it was rejected by Biglow and Main, ostensibly because the directors believed the public would not buy a hymnal featuring only two composers, but probably due to the complexity of the melodies.
In 1874 Crosby was reported to be "living in a destitute condition".
Blumhofer suggests their estrangement was because Van denied Crosby the romantic love she desired due to the effect of the death of their daughter in 1859, and because their housing choices offered them little privacy. Others suggest the separation was the result of in the increase of Crosby's outside interests, including writing hymns and rescue work.
Van Alstyne rarely accompanied Crosby when she travelled, and she vacationed without him. Despite living separately for more than two decades, Crosby insisted that they "maintained an amiable relationship", kept in contact with one another, and even ministered together on occasions in this period. For example, on June 15, 1895 in Yonkers, New York
, Van Alstyne played a piano solo, and Crosby read an ode
to Captain John Underhill
, the progenitor of the American branch of the Underhill family, at the third annual reunion of the Underhill Society of America. Crosby's only recorded admission of marital unhappiness was in 1903, when she commented on her late husband in Will Carleton
's This is My Story: "He had his faults — and so have I mine, but notwithstanding these, we loved each other to the last".
and his wife, Fannie, and near the mansion owned by Phoebe Knapp.
Crosby was "the most prolific of all nineteenth-century American sacred song writers". By the end of her career she had written almost 9000 hymns, using scores of noms de plume assigned to her by publishers who wanted to disguise the proliferation of her compositions in their publications. It is estimated that books containing her lyrics sold 100 million copies. However, due to the low regard for lyricists in the popular song industry during her lifetime, and what June Hadden Hobbs sees as "the hypocrisy of sacred music publishers" which resulted for Crosby in "a sad and probably representative tale of exploitation of female hymn writers", and the contemporary perception that "Crosby made a very profitable living off writing songs that were sung (and played) by the masses", "like many of the lyricists of the day, Crosby was exploited by copyright conventions that assigned rights not to the lyricist but to the composer of the music; ... Crosby was paid a flat fee of one or two dollars a hymn". In her 1906 autobiography, Crosby insisted that she wrote her hymns "in a sanctified manner", and never for financial or commercial considerations, and that she had donated her royalties to "worthy causes". Crosby set a goal of winning a million people to Christ through her hymns, and whenever she wrote a hymn she prayed it would bring women and men to Christ, and kept careful records of those reported to have been saved through her hymns.
Referring to Crosby's songs, the Dictionary of American Religious Biography indicated: "by modern standards her work may be considered mawkish or too sentimental. But their simple, homey appeal struck a responsive chord in Victorian culture
. Their informal ballad
style broke away from the staid, formal approach of earlier periods, touching deep emotions in singers and listeners alike. Instead of dismissing her words as maudlin or saccharine, audiences thrilled to them as the essence of genuine, heartfelt Christianity". Crosby's hymns were popular because they placed "a heightened emphasis on religious experiences, emotions, and testimonies" and relected "a sentimental, romanticized relationship between the believer and Christ", rather than using the negative descriptions of earlier hymns that emphasised the sinfulness of people.
Ann Douglas argues that Crosby was one of the female authors who "emasculated American religion" and helped shift it from "a rigorous Calvinism" to "an anti-intellectual and sentimental mass culture". Feminist scholars have suggested that "emphases in her hymns both revealed and accelerated the feminizing of American evangelicalism".
Her hymns were published by many notable publishers and publishing companies:
endeavors. Eventually Crosby entrusted to Doane the business aspects of her compositions.
In early 1868 Crosby met millionaire Methodist Phoebe Palmer Knapp
, who was married to Joseph Fairchild Knapp, co-founder of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. The Knapps published hymnals initially for use in the Sunday School of the St. John's Methodist Episcopal Church in Brooklyn, which was superintended by Joseph F. Knapp for 22 years, while Phoebe Knapp took responsibility for 200 children in the infants' department. They first collaborated on Notes of Joy, the first hymnal edited by Knapp, who also contributed 94 of the 172 tunes, and published by her brother Walter C. Palmer, Jr. in 1869. Of the 21 hymns Crosby contributed to Notes of Joy, including eight as "The Children's Friend", Knapp provided the music for fourteen of them. Their best-known collaboration was "Blessed Assurance
", for which Crosby wrote words in the Knapps' music room for a tune written by Knapp, while Crosby was staying at the Knapp Mansion in 1873.
From 1871 to 1908, Crosby worked with Ira Sankey, who helped make her "a household name to Protestants around the world". While Sankey was "the premier promoter" of gospel songs, "Crosby ranked first as their provider". The evangelistic team of Sankey and Dwight L. Moody
brought many of Crosby's hymns to the attention of Christians throughout the United States and Britain. Crosby was close friends with Sankey and his wife, Frances, and often stayed with them at their home in Northfield, Massachusetts
from 1886 for the annual summer Christian Workers' Conferences, and later in their Brooklyn. After Sankey's eyesight was destroyed by glaucoma
in March 1903, their friendship deepened and they often continued to compose hymns together at Sankey's harmonium
in his home.
In 1921 Edward S. Ninde wrote: "None would claim that she was a poetess in any large sense. Her hymns ... have been severely criticised. Dr. Julian, the editor of the Dictionary of Hymnology, says that 'they are, with few exceptions, very weak and poor,' and others insist that they are 'crudely sentimental.' Some hymn books will give them no place whatever". According to Glimpses of Christian History, Crosby's "hymns have sometimes been criticized as 'gushy and mawkishly sentimental' and critics have often attacked both her writing and her theology. The fact remains, however, that she has exerted an enormous influence on American hymnody, and some of her hymns are still cherished by believers today. Although thousands of her hymns have faded into obscurity over the years, they nevertheless were meaningful to her contemporaries, speaking to their lives and expressing their devotion to God. As fellow hymn writer George C. Stebbins stated, 'There was probably no writer in her day who appealed more to the valid experience of the Christian life or who expressed more sympathetically the deep longings of the human heart than Fanny Crosby.' And many of her hymns have stood the test of time, still resonating with believers today".
" (1868); and "Rescue the Perishing" (1869), which became the "theme song of the home missions movement", and was "perhaps the most popular city mission song", with its "wedding of personal piety and compassion for humanity". Crosby celebrated the rescue mission movement in her 1895 hymn, "The Rescue Band".
As Crosby had lived for decades in such areas of New York City as Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
, The Bowery, and The Tenderloin
, she was aware personally of the great needs of immigrants and the urban poor, and was passionate to help those around her through urban rescue missions and other compassionate ministry organizations. Crosby indicated "from the time I received my first check for my poems, I made up my mind to open my hand wide to those who needed assistance". Throughout her life, Crosby was described as having "a horror of wealth", never set prices to speak, often refused honoraria, and "what little she did accept she gave away almost as soon as she got it". After her marriage, Crosby "had other priorities and gave away anything that was not necessary to their daily survival". The Van Alstynes also organized concerts, with half the proceeds given to aid the poor. Throughout New York City, Crosby's sympathies for the poor were well-known, but consisted primarily of indirect involvement by giving contributions from the sale of her poems, and by writing and sending poems for special occasions for these missions to the dispossessed, as well as sporadic visits to those missions.
"More Like Jesus Would I Be", her first hymn written for Doane in June 1867, expressly for the sixth anniversary of the Howard Mission and Home for Little Wanderers, a nondenominational mission at New Bowery, Manhattan.
After speaking at a service at the Manhattan prison
in spring 1868, Crosby was inspired to write "Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
" after comments by some prisoners for the Lord not to pass them by, with Doane setting it to music and publishing it in Songs of Devotion in 1870. "Pass Me Not" became her first hymn to have global appeal, after it was used by Ira Sankey in is crusades with Moody in Britain in 1874. Sankey said, "No hymn was more popular at the meetings in London in 1875 [sic] than this one.
In April 1868 Crosby wrote "Fifty Years Ago" for the semi-centennial of the New-York Port Society, which was founded in 1818 "for the promotion of the Gospel among the seamen in the Port of New-York".
By July 1869 Crosby was attending at least weekly meetings organized by the interdenominational New York City Mission, After a young man was converted through her testimony, Crosby was inspired to write the words for "Rescue the Perishing" based on a title and a tune given to her by William Howard Doane
a few days earlier. In his 1907 book My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns, Ira Sankey recalled the origins of "Rescue the Perishing":
, the Bowery Mission
, the Howard Mission, the Cremore Mission, the Door of Hope, and other skid row
missions. Additionally, Crosby spoke at YMCA
s, churches, and prisons about the needs of the urban poor. Additionally, Crosby was a passionate supporter of Frances Willard
and the Women's Christian Temperance Union and its endeavors to urge either abstinence or moderation in the use of alcohol. For example, before 1879 Crosby wrote the words for the song "The Red Pledge", which advocated total abstinence from imbibing alcohol.
), "America's first rescue mission", in Manhattan, which was founded to minister to alcoholics and the unemployed by a former prostitute, Maria
and Jeremiah "Jerry" McAuley
, a former alcoholic, thief, and convict who had become a Christian in Sing Sing
prison in 1864. Crosby often attended the Water Street Mission, "conversing and counseling with those she met".
For two decades From November 1881, Crosby also supported the Bowery Mission
in Manhattan. As the Bowery Mission welcomed the ministry of women, Crosby worked actively at the Mission, often attending and speaking in the evening meetings.
Each year until the building was razed in a fire in 1897, Crosby addressed the large crowds attending the anniversary service, where she would also recite one of her poems written for the occasion, many of which were set to music by Victor Benke, the Mission's volunteer organist from 1893 to 1897. Among the songs Crosby and Benke collaborated on were six songs published in 1901: "He Has Promised", "There's a Chorus Ever Ringing", "God Bless Our School Today", "Is There Something I Can Do?", "On Joyful Wings", and "Keep On Watching".
After McAuley's death, Crosby continued to support the Cremorne Mission, now led by Samuel Hopkins Hadley.
By May 1900 Crosby had been ill with a serious heart condition for a few months, and still showed some effects from a fall, which prompted her half-sisters to travel to Brooklyn to convince her to move from her room in the home of poet Will Carleton
in Brooklyn, New York to Bridgeport, Connecticut, to live with Julia "Jule" Athington, her widowed half-sister and Jule's widowed younger sister, Caroline "Carrie" W. Rider. Soon after Crosby and Rider rented a room together, before both moving to a rented apartment, where they lived until 1906.
After moving to Bridgeport, Crosby usually attended the First Methodist Church. Crosby was also involved actively with the Salvation Army
, and the Christian Union rescue mission, often attending the nightly services, and frequently giving a gospel message through her poems and prose. In 1904 Crosby formally transferred her church membership from Cornell Memorial Methodist Church in Manhattan to the First Methodist Church of Bridgeport.
On July 18, 1902, Crosby's husband, Alexander van Alstyne, who was living with Caroline and David Harris Underhill
in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, died. Fearing for Crosby's health, William Doane and her publishers, Biglow and Main, convinced Crosby not to travel to New York City at that time. Phoebe Knapp paid for his burial, but not a gravestone, at Mt. Olivet Cemetery.
Another wealthy friend of Crosby was popular American poet, author, and lecturer Will Carleton, with whom Crosby had lived in her last years in Brooklyn, and who had been giving lectures on Crosby's hymns and life, and had published a series of articles on Crosby in his Every Where magazine (which had a peak circulation of 50,000 copies a month) in 1901, for which he paid her $10 an article. In 1902 Carleton wrote a tribute to Crosby that was published in his Songs of Two Centures.
At Knapp's instigation, Carleton revised those articles and wrote Fanny Crosby's Life-Story, a biography authorized initially by Crosby, which was published by July 1903, and reviewed favorably by The New York Times on July 25. Carleton's book sold for $1 a copy. This was the first full-length biographical account of Crosby's life, although Robert Lowry had written a sixteen-page biographical sketch that was published in 1897 in her last book of poems, Bells of Evening and Other Verses. In the advertisement at the front of the book, the following statement from "the author" was signed with a facsimile of Crosby's signature: "'Fanny Crosby's Life-Story' is published and sold for my benefit, and I hope by its means to be a welcome guest in many homes". Additionally, Carleton wrote:
According to Ruffin, Carleton's book "went over like a lead balloon with Fanny's publishers", although there was nothing negative written explicitly about Biglow and Main, but also little praise for the firm and its members. Croby is quoted as referring to Biglow and Main: "with whom I have maintained most cordial and even affectionate relations, for many years past". Carleton's book did not use any of Crosby's hymns owned by Biglow and Main. Hubert Main believed: "Will Carleton wanted to ignore the Biglow & Main Company and all its writers as far as possible and set himself up as the one of her friends who was helping her". Biglow and Main believed Carleton and Knapp were guilty of "a brutal attack on Fanny", and were plotting to "take over" Crosby. At the fortieth anniversary reception and dinner held in Manhattan to celebrate Crosby's association with Bradbury and Biglow and Main in February 1904, Phoebe Knapp was not invited as she was persona non grata
at Biglow and Main.
Biglow and Main, who were concerned that this book would diminish sales of Crosby's Bells at Evening and Other Verses, which they had published in 1897, and which contained Lowry's biographical sketch of Crosby, and through Doane convinced Crosby to write to both Carleton and Knapp, as well as a letter to The New York Times and also to threaten to sue Carelton in April 1904 for an accounting of the sales of the book for which she was promised 10 cents a copy royalties, and seeking an injunction
to prevent its continued publication as she believed Carelton misrepresented her by describing her to be in poor health and living alone in extreme poverty, whereas she was receiving $25 a week income from Biglow and Main, and living with relatives who cared for her. Crosby indicated she had no desire to be a homeowner, and that if she was ever living in poverty, it was her choice.
In response to Crosby's letter and threats of a lawsuit, Carleton wrote in an open letter to The New York Times on April 7, 1904, that he was motivated to write his "labor of love" for Crosby in order to raise money that she might have a home of her own for the first time in her life; that he had interviewed Crosby and transcribed the details of her life; had paid her for her time and materials; had secured her permission to publish the material in his magazine Every Where, and in a book; had paid all the expenses for publishing and printing out of his own pocket; had promoted the book in his own time and at his own expense; and had remitted to her $235.20 for the royalties owing for the previous eight months at the agreed rate, and had sent additional contributions given by admirers at his lectures to her. Sankey, who paid the rent on the Bridgeport house where Crosby lived with her half-sister Carrie, implied in an article in The Christian that "the Carleton business had been of Satanic origin and commented, echoing the wheat and tares passage in scripture, 'An enemy hath done this'".
In 1904 Knapp contacted Methodist Episcopal Church Bishop Charles Cardwell McCabe
and enlisted his assistance in publicising Crosby's poverty and raising funds to ameliorate that situation. After securing Crosby's permission to solicit funds for her benefit, in June 1904 the religious press (including The Christian Advocate), carried McCabe's request for money for Crosby under the heading "Fanny Crosby in Need". McCabe indicated that "her hymns have never been copyrighted in her own name, she has sold them for small sums to the publishers who hold the copyright themselves, and the gifted authoress has but little monetary reward for hymns that have been sung all over the world". By July 1904 newspapers reported that Crosby's publishers had issued a statement denying Crosby was in need of funds, and indicated she never would be "as they have provided abundantly for her during her entire life", and that "Bishop McCabe, who issued an appeal for assistance for Miss Crosby has been grossly deceived by somebody". In response to Bishop McCabe's fundraising on her behalf, Crosby also wrote a letter to him which was published at her instigation, which permitted him to solicit funds from her friends as "a testimonial of their love", but reiterated that she was not living in poverty, nor was she dying or in poor health. After Crosby and her representatives contacted him, a week later, McCabe wrote to The Christian Advocate explaining his rationale for raising funds for Crosby, but that he was now withdrawing the appeal at her request.
In July 1904, the matter was still not settled, however it came to an end before Fanny Crosby Day in March 1905, after Carleton's wife, Adora Niles Goodell Carleton, died suddenly.
In 1905 Carleton issued a new edition of Fannie Crosby, Her Life Work, which was both expanded and "newly illustrated", and despite "the greater expense of production, the price remains One Dollar a copy", with Crosby to "receive the same liberal royalty", as the book was "SOLD FOR THE BLIND AUTHOR'S BENEFIT". In December 1905 Crosby issued a card protesting the continued sale of Carleton's book, again denying she was "in distress", as she was in "comfortable circumstances and very active", giving lectures at leat once a week. Crosby indicated she had received less than $325 from the sale of the book, that her "requests had been disregarded", but that "when these facts are fully known to all, the publishers can sell the book as they desire; only I have no wish to increase its sale for my own benefit, which, of course, is very small".
Despite Crosby's efforts, Carleton still advertised the book for sale in his Every Where magazine every year until at least 1911. In 1911 Carleton serialised and updated Crosby's life story in Every Where. The 1906 publication of Crosby's own autobiography, Memories of Eighty Years, which, in contrast to Carleton's book focused on Crosby's hymn-writing years, was sold by subscription and door-to-door, and promoted in lectures by Doane, raised $1,000 for Crosby.
For a period Crosby and Knapp were estranged in their relationship because of the Carleton book, with Knapp even travelling to Bridgeport to give Crosby "a big blowing up and put Fanny on her back". Knapp also wrote Crosby two letters "threatening heavy damages if Crosby sued either her or Carleton". Despite these developments, by early 1905 the "tempest passed", with Crosby and Knapp reconciled.
Because of Carrie Rider's cancer, in summer 1906 Crosby and Rider moved to 226 Wells Street, Bridgeport, Connecticut. Carrie died of intestinal cancer in July 1907.
On July 10, 1908, Phoebe Knapp died. Weeks later, Ira Sankey died having just sang "Saved by Grace", one of Crosby's most popular compositions.
On May 2, 1911, Crosby spoke to 5000 people at the opening meeting of the Evangelistic Committee's seventh annual campaign held in Carnegie Hall
, after the crowd sang her songs for thirty minutes. On her 94th birthday in March 1914, Alice Rector and the King's Daughters of the First Methodist Church of Bridgeport, Connecticut organized a Violet Day to honor Crosby, which was publicised nationally by Hugh Main.
and a cerebral hemorrhage on February 12, 1915 at Bridgeport. She was buried at the Mountain Grove Cemetery
in Bridgeport, near to her mother and other members of her family. At Crosby's request, her family erected a very small tombstone, which carried the words: "Aunt Fanny: She hath done what she could; Fanny J. Crosby".
In March 1925, about 3000 churches throughout the United States observed Fanny Crosby Day to commemorate the 105th anniversary of her birth.
On Monday October 8, 1934, the Enoch Crosby chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution
dedicated an historic roadside marker commemorating the birthplace of Crosby on the western side of Route 22, in Doanesburg, New York.
Despite her specific instructions not to erect a large marble monument, on May 1, 1955, a large memorial stone that "dwarfed the original gravestone" was dedicated by Crosby's "friends to whom her life was an inspiration". It contained the first stanza of "Blessed Assurance
".
in 1975.
During 2010 the songwriter George Hamilton IV
undertook a tour of Methodist chapels celebrating Fanny's outstanding contribution to gospel music. His presentation included stories of her productive and charitable life, some of her hymns and a few of his own uplifting songs.
Crosby is honored with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America
on February 11.
This page originally based on public domain
information from The Cyber Hymnal
Methodist Episcopal Church
The Methodist Episcopal Church, sometimes referred to as the M.E. Church, was a development of the first expression of Methodism in the United States. It officially began at the Baltimore Christmas Conference in 1784, with Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke as the first bishops. Through a series of...
rescue mission worker, poet, lyricist, and composer. During her lifetime, she was well-known throughout the United States. By the end of the 19th century, she was "a household name in evangelical Protestant circles" globally, and "one of the most prominent figures in American evangelical life". She became blind as a child.
Best known for her Protestant Christian hymn
Hymn
A hymn is a type of song, usually religious, specifically written for the purpose of praise, adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification...
s and gospel songs, Crosby was "the premier hymnist of the gospel song period (ca. 1870-1920)", and one of the most prolific hymnists in history, writing over 8000, with over 100 million copies of her songs printed. Crosby was inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame
Gospel Music Hall of Fame
The Gospel Music Hall of Fame, created in 1971 by the Gospel Music Association, is a Hall of Fame dedicated exclusively to recognizing meaningful contributions by individuals and groups in all forms of gospel music.-Inductees:...
in 1975. Known as the "Queen of Gospel Song Writers", and as the "Mother of modern congregational singing in America",
with "dozens of her hymns continue to find a place in the hymnals of Protestant evangelicalism around the world", with most American hymnal
Hymnal
Hymnal or hymnary or hymnbook is a collection of hymns, i.e. religious songs, usually in the form of a book. The earliest hand-written hymnals are known since Middle Ages in the context of European Christianity...
s containing her work, as "with the possible exception of Isaac Watts and Charles Wesley, Crosby has generally been represented by the largest number of hymns of any writer of the twentieth century in nonliturgical hymnals". Her gospel songs were "paradigmatic of all revival music", and Ira Sankey attributed the success of the Moody and Sankey
Moody and Sankey
Moody and Sankey was the evangelical duo of Ira David Sankey and Dwight Lyman Moody. Starting after their meeting in June 1871, the team wrote Christian songs and traveled throughout the United States and the United Kingdom calling people to God through their use of song, with Moody preaching and...
evangelical campaigns largely to Crosby's hymns. Some of Crosby's best-known songs include "Blessed Assurance
Blessed Assurance
"Blessed Assurance" is a well-known Christian hymn. The lyrics were written in 1873 by blind hymn writer Fanny J. Crosby to the music written in 1873 by Phoebe P. Knapp.-History:...
", "Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
"Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior" is a 19th-century American hymn written by Francis J. Crosby in 1868 and William H. Doane in 1870 . The hymn has been recorded by number of artists, including Reggie Houston, Cyrus Chestnut, Bill Gaither, and Lyle Lovett...
", "Jesus Is Tenderly Calling You Home", "Praise Him, Praise Him", "Rescue the Perishing", and "To God Be the Glory
To God Be the Glory
To God Be the Glory is a hymn with text by Fanny Crosby and tune by William Howard Doane. It is believed to date to around 1875.-Lyrics:vs.1To God be the glory, great things He has done;So loved He the world that He gave us His Son,...
". Because some publishers were hesitant to have so many hymns by one person in their hymnals, Crosby used nearly 200 different pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
s during her career.
Crosby wrote over 1,000 secular poems, and had four books of poetry published, as well as two best-selling autobiographies. Crosby was the subject of at least a dozen biographies. Additionally, Crosby co-wrote popular secular songs, as well as political and patriotic songs, and at least five cantata
Cantata
A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....
s on biblical and patriotic themes, including The Flower Queen, the first secular cantata by an American composer. Crosby was committed to Christian rescue missions, and was known for her public speaking.
Early life and family background
Frances Jane "Fanny" Crosby was born on March 24, 1820, in the village of BrewsterBrewster, New York
Brewster is a village within the town of Southeast in Putnam County, New York, United States. Its population was 2,162 at the 2000 census. The village is the most densely populated portion of the town...
, about fifty miles north of New York City. She was the only child of John Crosby, a widower who had a daughter from his first marriage, and his second wife, Mercy Crosby, both of whom were relatives of Revolutionary War spy Enoch Crosby
Enoch Crosby
Enoch Crosby was an American soldier and spy during the Revolutionary War. His life may have been the basis for the character Harvey Birch in James Fenimore Cooper's novel The Spy.-Early life:...
. According to C. Bernard Ruffin
C. Bernard Ruffin
C. Bernard Ruffin is an American non-fiction writer who has written many books on religious subjects. He currently resides in Reston, Virginia where he taught history for twenty-five years at South Lakes High School. He is assistant pastor at Holy Comforter Lutheran Church in Washington,...
, John and Mercy were possibly first cousins, however "by the time Fanny Crosby came to write her memoirs [in 1906], the fact that her mother and father were related ... had become a source of embarrassment, and she maintained that she did not know anything about his lineage".
Crosby was proud of her Puritan
Puritan
The Puritans were a significant grouping of English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries. Puritanism in this sense was founded by some Marian exiles from the clergy shortly after the accession of Elizabeth I of England in 1558, as an activist movement within the Church of England...
heritage, and said in 1903: "My ancestors were Puritans; my family tree rooted around Plymouth Rock". Crosby traced her ancestry from Ann Brigham and Simon Crosby who arrived in Boston in 1635, and was one of the founders of Harvard College
Harvard College
Harvard College, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is one of two schools within Harvard University granting undergraduate degrees...
, whose descendants later married into Mayflower families
Mayflower
The Mayflower was the ship that transported the English Separatists, better known as the Pilgrims, from a site near the Mayflower Steps in Plymouth, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts, , in 1620...
, making Crosby a descendant of Elder William Brewster
William Brewster (Pilgrim)
Elder William Brewster was a Mayflower passenger and a Pilgrim colonist leader and preacher.-Origins:Brewster was probably born at Doncaster, Yorkshire, England, circa 1566/1567, although no birth records have been found, and died at Plymouth, Massachusetts on April 10, 1644 around 9- or 10pm...
, Edward Winslow
Edward Winslow
Edward Winslow was an English Pilgrim leader on the Mayflower. He served as the governor of Plymouth Colony in 1633, 1636, and finally in 1644...
, and Thomas Prence
Thomas Prence
Thomas Prence was a co-founder of Eastham, Massachusetts, a political leader in both the Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay colonies, and governor of Plymouth .-Early life:...
, and later a member of the exclusive Daughters of the Mayflower. Crosby was also later a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution
Daughters of the American Revolution
The Daughters of the American Revolution is a lineage-based membership organization for women who are descended from a person involved in United States' independence....
in Bridgeport, Connecticut
Bridgeport, Connecticut
Bridgeport is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. Located in Fairfield County, the city had an estimated population of 144,229 at the 2010 United States Census and is the core of the Greater Bridgeport area...
, writing the verses of the state song of the Connecticut branch.
Through Simon Crosby, Fanny was also a relative of Presbyterian minister Howard Crosby and his son, neoabolitionist Ernest Howard Crosby
Ernest Howard Crosby
Ernest Howard Crosby was an American reformer and author, born in New York City, the son of Presbyterian minister Howard Crosby, and a relative of prolific hymnwriter and rescue mission worker Fanny Crosby....
, as well as singers Bing Crosby
Bing Crosby
Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby was an American singer and actor. Crosby's trademark bass-baritone voice made him one of the best-selling recording artists of the 20th century, with over half a billion records in circulation....
and his brother, Bob
Bob Crosby
George Robert "Bob" Crosby was an American dixieland bandleader and vocalist, best known for his group the Bob-Cats.-Family:...
.
Southeast, New York (1820-1823)
When six weeks old, Crosby caught a cold and developed inflammation of the eyes. Mustard poulticePoultice
A poultice, also called cataplasm, is a soft moist mass, often heated and medicated, that is spread on cloth over the skin to treat an aching, inflamed, or painful part of the body. It can be used on wounds such as cuts...
s were applied to treat the discharges. According to Crosby, this procedure damaged her optic nerve
Optic nerve
The optic nerve, also called cranial nerve 2, transmits visual information from the retina to the brain. Derived from the embryonic retinal ganglion cell, a diverticulum located in the diencephalon, the optic nerve doesn't regenerate after transection.-Anatomy:The optic nerve is the second of...
s and blinded her. Many physicians today, however, "suggest it is much more likely that her blindness was congenital", and that "at such an early age her sightless condition may well have escaped her parents".
Her father died in November 1820, and Crosby was then raised by her mother and maternal grandmother, Eunice.
North Salem, New York (1823-1828)
When Crosby was aged three, the family moved to North Salem, New YorkNorth Salem, New York
North Salem is a town in the northeast part of Westchester County, New York, United States. The county ranks second for wealthiest counties in New York State and the seventh wealthiest county nationally...
, where Eunice had been raised. While residing in North Salem, the Crosbys attended the Peach Pond Society of Friends meetinghouse near Peach Lake
Peach Lake, New York
Peach Lake is a hamlet located mostly in the town of Southeast in Putnam County, New York; a portion of the CDP is in the town of North Salem in Westchester County. As of the 2010 census, the population was 1,629....
.
In April 1825 Crosby was examined by Valentine Mott
Valentine Mott
Valentine Mott , American surgeon, was born at Glen Cove, New York.He graduated at Columbia College, studied under Sir Astley Cooper in London, and also spent a winter in Edinburgh. After acting as demonstrator of anatomy he was appointed professor of surgery in Columbia College in 1809...
, who Neptune has called "America's premier surgeon". He concluded that Crosby's condition was inoperable and that her blindness was permanent.
At the age of eight Crosby wrote her first poem, which described her condition:
- Oh what a happy soul I am,
- Although I cannot see;
- I am resolved that in this world
- Contented I will be.
- How many blessings I enjoy,
- That other people don't;
- To weep and sigh because I'm blind,
- I cannot, and I won't.
Crosby later remarked: "It seemed intended by the blessed providence of God that I should be blind all my life, and I thank him for the dispensation. If perfect earthly sight were offered me tomorrow I would not accept it. I might not have sung hymns to the praise of God if I had been distracted by the beautiful and interesting things about me." Crosby also once said, "when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior". When asked about her blindness, Crosby was reported as saying that "had it not been for her affliction she might not have so good an education or have so great an influence, and certainly not so fine a memory".
Ridgefield, Connecticut (1828-1834)
In 1828 Mercy and Crosby moved to the home of a Mrs. Hawley in Ridgefield, ConnecticutRidgefield, Connecticut
Ridgefield is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. Situated in the foothills of the Berkshire Mountains, the 300-year-old community had a population of 24,638 at the 2010 census. The town center, which was formerly a borough, is defined by the U.S...
. Crosby's mother worked as household servant. While residing in Ridgefield, they attended the Presbyterian church on the Village Green.
Crosby's mother and grandmother grounded Crosby in Protestant Christian principles, helping her, for example, memorize long passages from the Bible. Historian Edith L. Blumhofer described the Crosby home environment as sustained by "an abiding Christian faith".
With the encouragement of her grandmother, and later Mrs. Hawley, from the age of ten, Crosby had memorized five chapters of the Bible each week, until by the age of fifteen Crosby had memorized the four gospels, the Pentateuch, the Book of Proverbs
Book of Proverbs
The Book of Proverbs , commonly referred to simply as Proverbs, is a book of the Hebrew Bible.The original Hebrew title of the book of Proverbs is "Míshlê Shlomoh" . When translated into Greek and Latin, the title took on different forms. In the Greek Septuagint the title became "paroimai paroimiae"...
, the Song of Solomon
Song of songs
Song of Songs, also known as the Song of Solomon, is a book of the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament. It may also refer to:In music:* Song of songs , the debut album by David and the Giants* A generic term for medleysPlays...
, and many of the Psalms
Psalms
The Book of Psalms , commonly referred to simply as Psalms, is a book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Bible...
.
From 1832, a music teacher came to Ridgefield twice a week to give singing lessons to Crosby and some of the other children. Around the same time, Crosby attended her first Methodist church services at the Methodist Episcopal Church where she was delighted by their hymns.
New York Institution for the Blind (1835–1845)
In 1835, just before her 15th birthday, Crosby enrolled at the New York Institution for the BlindNew York Institute for the Blind
The New York Institute for the Blind was founded in 1831 as a school for blind children by Samuel Wood, a Quaker philanthropist, Samuel Akerly, a physician, and John Dennison Russ, a philanthropist and physician....
(NYIB), a state-financed asylum. She remained there for eight years as a student, and another two years as a graduate pupil, during which she learned to play the piano, organ, harp, and guitar, and became a good soprano singer.
In 1838, her mother Mercy Crosby remarried and the couple had three children together. Morris abandoned his wife in 1844.
Congressional lobbyist (1843-1846)
After graduation from the NYIB in 1843, Crosby joined a group of lobbyistsLobbying
Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by officials in the government, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying is done by various people or groups, from private-sector individuals or corporations, fellow legislators or government officials, or...
in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
arguing for support of education for the blind. Crosby was the first woman to speak in the United States Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
when she read a poem there. When Crosby appeared before a joint sitting of both houses of the United States Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
, she recited these lines:
- O ye, who here from every state convene,
- Illustrious band! may we not hope the scene
- You now behold will prove to every mind
- Instruction hath a ray to cheer the blind.
On January 24, 1844, Crosby was one of seventeen students from the NYIB who gave a concert for Congress, and she recited a thirteen stanza original composition that called for the creation of an institution for the education of the blind in every state. This "drew calls for an encore", and earned the congratulations of John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams was the sixth President of the United States . He served as an American diplomat, Senator, and Congressional representative. He was a member of the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican, and later Anti-Masonic and Whig parties. Adams was the son of former...
. On January 29, 1844 Crosby and nineteen other Blind Institution students gave a presentation to Daniel Haines
Daniel Haines
Daniel Haines was an American jurist who served as the 14th Governor of New Jersey.Daniel Haines was born in New York City, the nephew of Governor Aaron Ogden. He graduated from The College of New Jersey in 1820, and went on to practice law in Newton and Hamburg...
, the governor; and the council and New Jersey General Assembly
New Jersey General Assembly
The New Jersey General Assembly is the lower house of the New Jersey Legislature.Since the election of 1967 , the Assembly has consisted of 80 members. Two members are elected from each of New Jersey's 40 legislative districts for a term of two years, each representing districts with average...
at Trenton, New Jersey, where she recited a twelve-stanza original poem calling for the aid and education of the blind.
When President James K. Polk
James K. Polk
James Knox Polk was the 11th President of the United States . Polk was born in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. He later lived in and represented Tennessee. A Democrat, Polk served as the 17th Speaker of the House of Representatives and the 12th Governor of Tennessee...
visited the NYIB in 1845, Crosby recited a poem she composed for the occasion that praised "republican government".
In April 1846, Crosby spoke before a joint session of the United States Congress, with delegations from the Boston and Philadelphia Institutions for the Blind, "to advocate support for the education of the blind in Boston, Philadelphia, and New York". She also testified before a special congressional subcommittee, and sang a song she composed in the music room at the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
for Polk and his wife. Among the songs she sang as she accompanied herself on the piano was her own composition:
- Our President! We humbly turn to thee -
- Are not the blind the objects of thy care?
New York Institution for the Blind (1846-1858)
In 1846 Crosby was an instructor at the NYIB, and was listed as a "graduate pupil". She subsequently joined the school's faculty, teaching grammar, rhetoric, and history; she remained there until three days before her wedding on March 5, 1858.While teaching at the NYIB, Crosby studied music under George F. Root, until his resignation in November 1850. In 1851 Crosby addressed the New York state legislature.
While teaching at the NYIB Crosby befriended future US president Grover Cleveland
Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. Cleveland is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents...
then aged 17. Cleveland and Crosby spent many hours together at the end of each day, and Cleveland often transcibed the poems Crosby dictated to him. Cleveland wrote a recommendation for Crosby which was published in her 1906 autobiography. Being unable to attend due to her health, Crosby wrote a poem that was read at the dedication of Cleveland's birthplace in Caldwell, New Jersey
Caldwell, New Jersey
Caldwell is a borough located in northwestern Essex County, New Jersey, about outside of New York. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough population was 7,822....
in March 1913.
Spiritual
Crosby, who considered herself a "primitive Presbyterian", and the other students of the Blind Institution were required to attend daily morning and evening prayers, as well as Sunday morning and evening services held there and conducted by visiting clergymen of a variety of denominations, including Dutch Reformed, EpiscopalianEpiscopal Church (United States)
The Episcopal Church is a mainline Anglican Christian church found mainly in the United States , but also in Honduras, Taiwan, Colombia, Ecuador, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, the British Virgin Islands and parts of Europe...
, Presbyterian, Congregationalist, and Methodist. From 1839 Crosby usually attended church services and class meetings, at the Eighteenth Street Methodist Episcopal Church (established in 1835) at 305-307 West 18th Street, in what is now the Chelsea district of New York City
Chelsea, Manhattan
Chelsea is a neighborhood on the West Side of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. The district's boundaries are roughly 14th Street to the south, 30th Street to the north, the western boundary of the Ladies' Mile Historic District – which lies between the Avenue of the Americas and...
.
Later Crosby's understanding of the Christian faith could be described as "rooted in Puritanism, developed by Methodism, warmed by the Holiness movement
Holiness movement
The holiness movement refers to a set of beliefs and practices emerging from the Methodist Christian church in the mid 19th century. The movement is distinguished by its emphasis on John Wesley's doctrine of "Christian perfection" - the belief that it is possible to live free of voluntary sin - and...
, and nourished by her Congregationalism
Congregational church
Congregational churches are Protestant Christian churches practicing Congregationalist church governance, in which each congregation independently and autonomously runs its own affairs....
".
Cholera epidemic (1849)
From May to November 1849, there was a choleraCholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine that is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The main symptoms are profuse watery diarrhea and vomiting. Transmission occurs primarily by drinking or eating water or food that has been contaminated by the diarrhea of an infected person or the feces...
epidemic in New York City. Crosby remained at the NYIB to nurse the sick, rather than leaving the city. Subsequently, according to Blumhofer, "Crosby seemed worn, languid, even depressed" when the Institution re-opened in November, forcing her to teach a lighter load. According to Bernard Ruffin
C. Bernard Ruffin
C. Bernard Ruffin is an American non-fiction writer who has written many books on religious subjects. He currently resides in Reston, Virginia where he taught history for twenty-five years at South Lakes High School. He is assistant pastor at Holy Comforter Lutheran Church in Washington,...
:
In this atmosphere of death and gloom, Fanny became increasingly introspective over her soul’s welfare. She began to realize that something was lacking in her spiritual life. She knew that she had gotten wrapped up in social, political, and educational reform, and did not have a true love for God in her heart. She had attended Methodist church meetings twice a week for several years, and although she helped with the music, she did so on the condition that she would not be called upon to testify.
1850 revival
In November 1850, Crosby was invited to attend the annual fall series of revival meetings at the newly constructed Thirtieth Street Methodist Episcopal Church (later renamed the Chelsea Methodist Episcopal Church). Despite attending each evening service during the fall campaign, and after two previous unsuccessful attempts to pray through to spiritual victory during those meetings, on November 20, 1850, Crosby left her pewPew
A pew is a long bench seat or enclosed box used for seating members of a congregation or choir in a church, or sometimes in a courtroom.-Overview:Churches were not commonly furnished with permanent pews before the Protestant Reformation...
again and knelt at the "anxious seat
Altar call
An altar call is a practice in some evangelical churches in which those who wish to make a new spiritual commitment to Jesus Christ are invited to come forward publicly. It is so named because the supplicants gather at the altar located at the front of the church building. In the Old Testament, an...
" at the front of the church sanctuary, and sought an assurance of her salvation.
Crosby later testified: "My very soul was flooded with celestial light. I sprang to my feet, shouting 'Hallelujah'". She described this "November Experience" as "a watershed of sorts in her life". However, Crosby acknowledged that there "was no sudden or dramatic change in her way of life", writing: "My growth in grace was very slow, from the beginning".
Church affiliation
Crosby did not become a member of any church until spring 1887, choosing rather to attend a variety of churches of various denominations, including the Plymouth Church of the PilgrimsPlymouth Church of the Pilgrims
Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims is a church in Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn, New York City. It was a station of the Underground Railroad, and the pulpit of Henry Ward Beecher, its first pastor...
in Brooklyn Heights, New York pastored since 1847 by Congregationalist abolitionist
Abolitionism
Abolitionism is a movement to end slavery.In western Europe and the Americas abolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and set slaves free. At the behest of Dominican priest Bartolomé de las Casas who was shocked at the treatment of natives in the New World, Spain enacted the first...
Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher was a prominent Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, abolitionist, and speaker in the mid to late 19th century...
who was acclaimed as a "prince of the pulpit" but was also an innovator with church music. She also attended the Fourth Avenue Presbyterian Church, pastored by her distant cousin Howard Crosby, and the Trinity Episcopal church. Crosby also liked to worship at the North West Dutch Reformed church
Dutch Reformed Church
The Dutch Reformed Church was a Reformed Christian denomination in the Netherlands. It existed from the 1570s to 2004, the year it merged with the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands to form the Protestant Church in the...
and the Central Presbyterian Church (later known as the Brooklyn Tabernacle).
In later life Crosby nominated Theodore Ledyard Cuyler
Theodore L. Cuyler
Theodore Ledyard Cuyler was a leading Presbyterian minister and religious writer in the United States....
, who pastored the North East Dutch Reformed Church
Sea and Land Church
The historic Sea and Land Church is located 61 Henry Street and Market Street in New York, NY. It was built in 1819 of manhattan schist, and added to the National Register of Historic Places on April 9, 1980. The structure is one of the three Georgian Gothic Revival churches on the Lower East Side...
as one of her favorite preachers.
While tradition insists Crosby was a member "in good standing" of the John Street
John Street Methodist Church
The John Street United Methodist Church located at 44 John Street in Manhattan, New York, USA was built in 1841. It is the third church located at the site...
Methodist Episcopal Church
Methodist Episcopal Church
The Methodist Episcopal Church, sometimes referred to as the M.E. Church, was a development of the first expression of Methodism in the United States. It officially began at the Baltimore Christmas Conference in 1784, with Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke as the first bishops. Through a series of...
in New York City, there are no contemporaneous records to confirm this. By 1869 Crosby attended the Chelsea Methodist Episcopal Church.
Holiness movement
While not identified publicly with the American holiness movementHoliness movement
The holiness movement refers to a set of beliefs and practices emerging from the Methodist Christian church in the mid 19th century. The movement is distinguished by its emphasis on John Wesley's doctrine of "Christian perfection" - the belief that it is possible to live free of voluntary sin - and...
of the second half of the 19th century, and despite having left no record of an experience of entire sanctification, Crosby was a fellow traveler of the Wesleyan holiness movement, including in her circle of friends prominent members of the American Holiness movement and attending Wesleyan/Holiness camp meeting
Camp meeting
The camp meeting is a form of Protestant Christian religious service originating in Britain and once common in some parts of the United States, wherein people would travel from a large area to a particular site to camp out, listen to itinerant preachers, and pray...
s. For example, Crosby was a friend of Walter and Phoebe Palmer
Phoebe Palmer
Phoebe Palmer was an evangelist and writer who promoted the doctrine of Christian perfection. She is considered one of the founders of the Holiness movement in the United States of America and the Higher Life movement in the United Kingdom.- Early life :Palmer was born Phoebe Worrall in New York...
, "the mother of the holiness movement", and "arguably the most influential female theologian in Christian history", and their daughter Phoebe Knapp
Phoebe Knapp
Phoebe Knapp was a composer of music for hymns and an organist.Knapp was born in New York City. Her parents were Walter C. Palmer and Phoebe Worrall Palmer...
, with whom she wrote "Blessed Assurance
Blessed Assurance
"Blessed Assurance" is a well-known Christian hymn. The lyrics were written in 1873 by blind hymn writer Fanny J. Crosby to the music written in 1873 by Phoebe P. Knapp.-History:...
", often visiting the Methodist camp grounds at Ocean Grove, New Jersey
Ocean Grove, New Jersey
Ocean Grove is an unincorporated community and a census-designated place in Neptune Township, Monmouth County, New Jersey. It had a population of 3,342 at the 2010 census. It is located on the Atlantic Ocean Jersey Shore, between Asbury Park to the north and Bradley Beach to the south...
, as their guest. For many years (from at least 1877 until at least 1897), Crosby vacationed each summer at Ocean Grove, where she would speak in the Great Auditorium and hold receptions in her cottage to meet her admirers.
In 1877 Crosby met William J. Kirkpatrick
William J. Kirkpatrick
William J. Kirkpatrick was born in Duncannon, Pennsylvania to a schoolteacher and musician, Thomas Kirkpatrick. He was exposed to and given formal training in music at a very young age. In 1854, he moved to Philadelphia to study music and carpentry. It was here that he studied vocal music under...
, one of the most prolific composers of gospel song tunes, and "the most prominent publisher in the Wesleyan/Holiness Movement", whom she called "Kirkie", with whom she wrote many hymns. Some of her hymns reflected her Wesleyan beliefs, including her call to consecrated Christian living in "I Am Thine, O Lord" (1875):
- Consecrate me now to Thy service, Lord,
- By the power of grace divine.
- Let my soul look up with a steadfast hope,
- And my will be lost in Thine.
In spring 1887 Crosby joined by "confession of faith" the Cornell Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church.
Poetry
Crosby's earliest published poem was on the theme of a dishonest miller, which was sent without her knowledge to P.T. Barnum, who published it in his The Herald of FreedomThe Herald of Freedom
The Herald of Freedom, established 1829, was a newspaper published by P T Barnum based in Danbury, Connecticut. The newspaper was created in reaction against the religious oppression and militant Calvinism Barnum had grown up with....
.
After some temporary opposition by the faculty of the Blind Institution, Crosby's inclination to versify was encouraged after she was examined by George Combe
George Combe
George Combe , was a Scottish lawyer and writer on phrenology and education. In later years, he devoted himself to the promotion of phrenology. His major work was The Constitution of Man .-Early life:...
, a visiting Scottish phrenologist
Phrenology
Phrenology is a pseudoscience primarily focused on measurements of the human skull, based on the concept that the brain is the organ of the mind, and that certain brain areas have localized, specific functions or modules...
, who pronounced her a "born poetess". The Institution found Hamilton Murray, who admitted his own inability to compose poetry, to teach her poetic composition.
In 1841 New York Herald
New York Herald
The New York Herald was a large distribution newspaper based in New York City that existed between May 6, 1835, and 1924.-History:The first issue of the paper was published by James Gordon Bennett, Sr., on May 6, 1835. By 1845 it was the most popular and profitable daily newspaper in the UnitedStates...
published Crosby's eulogistic
Eulogy
A eulogy is a speech or writing in praise of a person or thing, especially one recently deceased or retired. Eulogies may be given as part of funeral services. However, some denominations either discourage or do not permit eulogies at services to maintain respect for traditions...
poem on the death of President William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison was the ninth President of the United States , an American military officer and politician, and the first president to die in office. He was 68 years, 23 days old when elected, the oldest president elected until Ronald Reagan in 1980, and last President to be born before the...
, thus beginning her literary career. Crosby's poems were published frequently in The Saturday Evening Post
The Saturday Evening Post
The Saturday Evening Post is a bimonthly American magazine. It was published weekly under this title from 1897 until 1969, and quarterly and then bimonthly from 1971.-History:...
, the Clinton Signal, and the Fireman's Journal, and the Saturday Emporium.
Despite a serious illness that resulted in her leaving the Blind Institution to recuperate, Crosby's first published book, A Blind Girl and Other Poems, was published after encouragement by the Blind Institution in April 1844 by Putnam & Wiley. It contained 78 of her original poems and addresses, including what Crosby describes as her first published hymn, "An Evening Hymn", based on Psalm 4:8.
While Crosby was reluctant to have her poems published, as she considered them to be "unfinished productions", she acquiesced eventually as it would both publicise the Institution and raise funds for it.
In 1853 Crosby's Monterey and Other Poems, containing 101 poems and addresses was published by R. Craighead of New York City, because of her "sadly impaired health, and a frequent inability to discharge those duties from which I hitherto derived a maintenance", and the hope that "the Blind Girl's declining years be thereby rendered unclouded by that dependency so repulsive", and who was "ever assiduous for her self-support". In her 1903 autobiography edited by Will Carleton
Will Carleton
William McKendree Carleton was an American poet. Carleton's poems were most often about his rural life.-Early years:...
, Crosby indicates that at this time: "I was under a feeling of sadness and depression at this time". It included poems focusing on the recent Mexican-American War, and a poem pleading for the USA to help those affected by the Irish Potato Famine.
In 1853 Crosby's poem "The Blind Orphan Girl" was included in Caroline M. Sawyer's The History of the Blind Vocalists.
About the time Crosby resigned from the Blind Institution and was married, in 1858, her third book, A Wreath of Columbia's Flowers, containing four short stories and 30 poems was published.
Popular songs
Inspired by the success of the melodies of Stephen FosterStephen Foster
Stephen Collins Foster , known as the "father of American music", was the pre-eminent songwriter in the United States of the 19th century...
, between August 1851 and 1857 Crosby and George F. Root, who had taught music at the Blind Institution from 1845 to 1850, wrote at least sixty secular "people's songs" or parlour songs
Parlour music
Parlour music is a type of popular music which, as the name suggests, is intended to be performed in the parlours of middle class homes by amateur singers and pianists...
, some for the popular minstrel show
Minstrel show
The minstrel show, or minstrelsy, was an American entertainment consisting of comic skits, variety acts, dancing, and music, performed by white people in blackface or, especially after the Civil War, black people in blackface....
s. Due to the negative reputation of the minstrel shows among some Christians and classical musicians, both Root's and Crosby's participation in these compositions was deliberately obscured. According to Ruffin, "Like many cultured people of the day, [Root] considered native American music rather crude", and like many American artists and musicians of that era, chose to "Europeanize" his name, choosing to use the name George Friederich Wurzel (German for Root), while Crosby's name was sometimes omitted altogether. For many years Crosby was usually paid only $1 or $2 per poem with all rights to the song being retained by the composer or publisher of the music.
In the summer of 1851 George Root and Crosby both taught at the North Reading Musical Institute in North Reading Massachusetts
Reading, Massachusetts
Reading is an affluent town situated in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, some north of central Boston. The population was 24,747 at the 2010 census.-Settlement and Independence:...
. Crosby and Root's first song was "Fare Thee Well, Kitty Dear" (1851), a song that endeavored to evoke "Old-South imagery", with Crosby's lyrics based on a suggestion by Root, which Crosby described as "the grief of a colored man on the death of his beloved", and was written for and performed exclusively by Henry Wood's Minstrels. Published by John Andrews, who specialized in printing "Neat, quick & cheap", according to Karen Linn, "this song was not a hit, and had no lasting influence", as "its style is far too literary, the words not in dialect, the cause of sorrow seems to be a lover (rather than 'massa', or Little Eva, or homesickness: all more appropriate causes for slave sorrow according to the popular culture)". In 1852 Root signed a three-year contract with William Hall & Son.
Despite this initial setback, during her vacations in 1852 and 1853, Crosby continued to teach at North Reading, where she wrote the lyrics for many of her collaborations with Root. Among their joint compositions was "Bird of the North" (1852); and "Mother, Sweet Mother, Why Linger Away?" (1852).
Crosby and Root's first successful popular songs was "The Hazel Dell" (1853), a "sentimental ballad" described by its publisher as "a very pretty and easy song, containing the elements of great popularity", which was released as the work of G.F. Wurzel toward the end of 1853, and was a hit, that was "one of the most popular songs in the country", because of its performance by both Henry Wood's Minstrels and Christy's Minstrels
Christy's Minstrels
Christy's Minstrels, sometimes referred to as the Christy Minstrels, were a blackface group formed by Edwin Pearce Christy, a well-known ballad singer, in 1843, in Buffalo, New York. They were instrumental in the solidification of the minstrel show into a fixed three-act form...
, selling more than 200,000 copies of sheet music
Sheet music
Sheet music is a hand-written or printed form of music notation that uses modern musical symbols; like its analogs—books, pamphlets, etc.—the medium of sheet music typically is paper , although the access to musical notation in recent years includes also presentation on computer screens...
,. It is described as being on "the fringes of blackface minstrelsy, although it lacks dialect or any hint of buffoonery", was about a beautiful girl who died young:
In December 1854 in an article proclaiming the death of "Negro minstrelsy", the "Hazel Dell", along with Stephen C. Foster's 1851 song "Old Folks at Home
Old Folks at Home
"Old Folks at Home" is a minstrel song written by Stephen Foster in 1851. It was intended to be performed by the New York blackface troupe Christy's Minstrels. E. P. Christy, the troupe's leader, appears on early printings of the sheet music as the song's creator...
" and "My Old Kentucky Home
My Old Kentucky Home
"My Old Kentucky Home" is a minstrel song by Stephen Foster , probably composed in 1852. It was published as "My Old Kentucky Home, Good Night" in January 1853 by Firth, Pond, & Co. of New York...
" (1853), were mentioned as popular songs that were evidence of the "bleaching process, ... observable in the gradual rejection of the plantation, and the adoption of sentiments and poetic forms of expression, characteristic rather of the intelligent Caucasian".
Toward the end of 1853, William Hall & Son released "Greenwood Bell", at the same time as "Hazel Dell", but credited it to Root and Crosby. It describes the funeral of a child, a young man, and an aged person, and the tolling of the bell at the Greenwood Cemetery
Green-Wood Cemetery
Green-Wood Cemetery was founded in 1838 as a rural cemetery in Brooklyn, Kings County , New York. It was granted National Historic Landmark status in 2006 by the U.S. Department of the Interior.-History:...
. Other songs written by Crosby and Root included "O How Glad to Get Home"; "They Have Sold Me Down the River (The Negro Father's Lament)" (1853); Their song "There's Music in the Air" (1854) became a "hit song", and was listed in Variety Music Cavalcade as one of the most popular songs of 1854, and was in songbooks until at least the 1930s, becoming a college song at Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
.
After the expiration of Root's contract with William Hall & Son in 1855, Crosby-Root songs were published by other publishers, including Six Songs by Wurzel published in 1855 by S. Brainard's Sons of Cleveland, Ohio, after being rejected by Nathan Richardson of Russell & Richardson of Boston. These six Root-Crosby songs were "O How Glad to Get Home"; "Honeysuckle Glen"; "The Church in the Wood"; "All Together Now"; and "Proud World, Good-by". The most popular of these songs was "Rosalie, the Prairie Flower",
about the death of a young girl, popularized in the 1850s by the Christy Minstrels, which sold more than 125,000 copies of sheet music
Sheet music
Sheet music is a hand-written or printed form of music notation that uses modern musical symbols; like its analogs—books, pamphlets, etc.—the medium of sheet music typically is paper , although the access to musical notation in recent years includes also presentation on computer screens...
that earned nearly $3000 in royalties
Royalties
Royalties are usage-based payments made by one party to another for the right to ongoing use of an asset, sometimes an intellectual property...
for Root, and almost nothing for Crosby, after they failed to sell it originally for $100 to Richardson;
Crosby also wrote the words for popular songs for other composers, including "There is a Bright and Sunny Spot" (1856) for Clare W. Beames.
Cantatas
Between 1852 and 1854 Crosby wrote the librettoLibretto
A libretto is the text used in an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata, or musical. The term "libretto" is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major liturgical works, such as mass, requiem, and sacred cantata, or even the story line of a...
s of three cantata
Cantata
A cantata is a vocal composition with an instrumental accompaniment, typically in several movements, often involving a choir....
s for Root. Their first cantata was The Flower Queen; The Coronation of the Rose, (1852), often described as "the first secular cantata written by an American", an opera "in all but name", described as a "popular operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...
", which "illustrated nineteenth-century American romanticism". In her 1906 autobiography Crosby explained the theme of this cantata:
the story of which is as follows: an old man becoming tired of the world, decides to become a hermit; but, as he is about to retire to his lonely hut, he hears a chorus singing, "Who shall be queen of the flowers?" His interest is at once aroused; and on the following day he is asked to act as judge in a contest where each flower urges her claims to be queen of all the others. At length the hermit chooses the rose for her loveliness; and in turn she exhorts him to return to the world and to his duty.
Written as "a work for teenage girls (scored for first and second soprano
Soprano
A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...
and alto
Alto
Alto is a musical term, derived from the Latin word altus, meaning "high" in Italian, that has several possible interpretations.When designating instruments, "alto" frequently refers to a member of an instrumental family that has the second highest range, below that of the treble or soprano. Hence,...
)", The Flower Queen was performed first on March 11, 1853 by the young ladies of Jacob Abbott's Springer Institute, and almost immediately repeated by Root's students at the Rutgers Female Institute, and was praised by R. Storrs Willis. It was subsequently performed an estimated 1,000 times throughout the United States in the first four years after its publication. The success of The Flower Queen and subsequent cantatas, brought great acclaim and fortune to Root, with little of either for Crosby.
The second Root-Crosby cantata was Daniel, or the Captivity and Restoration, based on the Old Testament story of Daniel
Daniel
Daniel is the protagonist in the Book of Daniel of the Hebrew Bible. In the narrative, when Daniel was a young man, he was taken into Babylonian captivity where he was educated in Chaldean thought. However, he never converted to Neo-Babylonian ways...
, that was composed in 1853 for Root's choir at the Mercer Street Presbyterian Church in Manhattan. This cantata comprised 35 songs, with music composed with William Batchelder Bradbury
William Batchelder Bradbury
William Batchelder Bradbury was a musician who composed the tune to Jesus Loves Me and many other popular hymns.-Biography:...
, and words by Union Theological Seminary
Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York
Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York is a preeminent independent graduate school of theology, located in Manhattan between Claremont Avenue and Broadway, 120th to 122nd Streets. The seminary was founded in 1836 under the Presbyterian Church, and is affiliated with nearby Columbia...
student Chauncey Marvin Cady
Root & Cady
Root & Cady was a Chicago-based music publishing firm, founded in 1858. It became the most successful music publisher of the American Civil War and published many of the most popular songs during that war. The firm's founders were E. T...
and Crosby; Some of its principal choruses were first performed on July 15, 1853 by the students at Root's New-York Normal Institute.
In 1854 Root and Crosby collaborated to compose The Pilgrim Fathers, with Lowell Mason
Lowell Mason
Lowell Mason was a leading figure in American church music, the composer of over 1600 hymn tunes, many of which are often sung today. His most well-known tunes include Mary Had A Little Lamb and the arrangement of Joy to the World...
assisting with the music. Described as an "antebellum landmark" in dramatic cantatas, The Pilgrim Fathers, which "featured the contemporary evangelical reading of American history", was published by Oliver Ditson & Company of Boston, and released by Mason Brothers by August 1854.
Crosby wrote the libretto for a cantata entitled, The Excursion, with Baptist music professor Theodore Edson Perkins, one of the founders of New York music publishing house Brown & Perkins, writing the music. In 1886 Crosby and William Howard Doane wrote Santa Claus' Home; or, The Christmas Excursion, a Christmas cantata, published by Biglow & Main.
Political songs
In addition to poems of welcome to visiting dignitaries, Crosby wrote songs of a political nature, such as about the major battles of the Mexican-American War and the American Civil WarAmerican Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
. By the 1840 US Presidential election
United States presidential election, 1840
The United States presidential election of 1840 saw President Martin Van Buren fight for re-election against an economic depression and a Whig Party unified for the first time behind war hero William Henry Harrison and his "log cabin campaign"...
, Crosby was "an ardent Democrat" and wrote verse against the Whig candidate (and ultimate winner), William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison
William Henry Harrison was the ninth President of the United States , an American military officer and politician, and the first president to die in office. He was 68 years, 23 days old when elected, the oldest president elected until Ronald Reagan in 1980, and last President to be born before the...
. By 1852 Crosby switched her political allegiance from support for the Jacksonian Democrats
Jacksonian democracy
Jacksonian democracy is the political movement toward greater democracy for the common man typified by American politician Andrew Jackson and his supporters. Jackson's policies followed the era of Jeffersonian democracy which dominated the previous political era. The Democratic-Republican Party of...
to the anti-slavery
Abolitionism
Abolitionism is a movement to end slavery.In western Europe and the Americas abolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and set slaves free. At the behest of Dominican priest Bartolomé de las Casas who was shocked at the treatment of natives in the New World, Spain enacted the first...
Whigs
Whig Party (United States)
The Whig Party was a political party of the United States during the era of Jacksonian democracy. Considered integral to the Second Party System and operating from the early 1830s to the mid-1850s, the party was formed in opposition to the policies of President Andrew Jackson and his Democratic...
, writing the poem "Carry Me On" for the Whigs in 1852. After the election of Democrat Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce
Franklin Pierce was the 14th President of the United States and is the only President from New Hampshire. Pierce was a Democrat and a "doughface" who served in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate. Pierce took part in the Mexican-American War and became a brigadier general in the Army...
as US President in November 1856, she wrote:
- The election's past and I'm pierced at last
- The locos have gained the day.
A "strict abolitionist", Crosby suppported Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
and the newly-created Republican Party
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
. After the Civil War, Crosby was a devoted supporter of the Grand Army of the Republic
Grand Army of the Republic
The Grand Army of the Republic was a fraternal organization composed of veterans of the Union Army, US Navy, US Marines and US Revenue Cutter Service who served in the American Civil War. Founded in 1866 in Decatur, Illinois, it was dissolved in 1956 when its last member died...
and its political aims.
Patriotic songs
According to one source, Crosby "was so patriotic that when the Civil WarAmerican Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
broke out, she often pinned the Union flag to her blouse. When a southern lady found this offensive and snapped, 'Take that dirty rag away from here!' Fanny was incensed and told the woman to 'Repeat that remark at your risk!' The restaurant manager arrived on the scene just in time to prevent the two women from coming to blows".
During the American Civil War, Crosby "vented patriotism in verse", and it "evoked from Crosby an outpouring of songs -- some haunting, some mournful, some militaristic, a few even gory", but "her texts testified to her clear moral sense about the issues that fomented in the war years". Crosby wrote many poems supporting the Union cause
Union (American Civil War)
During the American Civil War, the Union was a name used to refer to the federal government of the United States, which was supported by the twenty free states and five border slave states. It was opposed by 11 southern slave states that had declared a secession to join together to form the...
, including "Dixie for the Union" (1861), a poem written before the outbreak of hostilities to the tune of Dixie
Dixie (song)
Countless lyrical variants of "Dixie" exist, but the version attributed to Dan Emmett and its variations are the most popular. Emmett's lyrics as they were originally intended reflect the mood of the United States in the late 1850s toward growing abolitionist sentiment. The song presented the point...
, a tune adopted later by the Confederate States of America
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...
as a patriotic anthem. The first of the five stanza
Stanza
In poetry, a stanza is a unit within a larger poem. In modern poetry, the term is often equivalent with strophe; in popular vocal music, a stanza is typically referred to as a "verse"...
s is:
- On! ye Patriots, to the battle
- Hear Fort Moultrie's cannon rattle:
- Then away, then away, then away to the fight!
- Go, meet those Southern traitors, with iron will,
- And should your courage falter, Boys,
- Remember Bunker Hill - Hurrah.
- Chorus: Hurrah — Hurrah, The Stars and Stripes forever
- Hurrah — Hurrah, Our Union shall not sever.
Soon after they met in February 1864, Crosby wrote the words and William B. Bradbury composed the music for a popular patriotic Civil War song "There is a Sound Among the Forest Trees". Crosby's text encourages volunteers to join the Union forces and incorporates references to the past of the United States including the Pilgrim Fathers and the Battle of Bunker Hill
Battle of Bunker Hill
The Battle of Bunker Hill took place on June 17, 1775, mostly on and around Breed's Hill, during the Siege of Boston early in the American Revolutionary War...
.
Also during the American Civil War, Crosby wrote "Song to Jeff Davis", directed at Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Finis Davis , also known as Jeff Davis, was an American statesman and leader of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, serving as President for its entire history. He was born in Kentucky to Samuel and Jane Davis...
, the president of the Confederate States of America, which expressed her belief in the morality of the Union cause: "Our stars and stripes are waving, And Heav'n will speed our cause". Crosby also wrote "Good-By, Old Arm", a tribute to wounded soldiers with music by Philip Philips; "Our Country"; and "A Tribute (to the memory of our dead heroes)".
As late as September 1908, Crosby wrote patriotic poems for the Daughters of the American Revolution
Daughters of the American Revolution
The Daughters of the American Revolution is a lineage-based membership organization for women who are descended from a person involved in United States' independence....
, including "The State We Honor", that extolled the virtues of her adopted state of Connecticut.
Marriage and family
In the summer of 1843 Crosby met her future husband, Alexander Van Alstyne, Jr. (sometimes Van Alstine or Van Alsteine) Alexander was blind and enrolled at the NYIB, where he was a casual acquaintance of Crosby and sometimes a student in her classes. From 1855 Van Alstyne was a teacher at NYIB for two years. During this time Crosby and Van Alstyne, whom his friends called "Van", were engaged to be married, necessitating her resignation from NYIB three days prior to their wedding at Maspeth, New York, on March 5, 1858.Maspeth, New York (1858-1859)
After their wedding, the Van Alstynes lived in a small home in the small rural village of Maspeth, New York, then with a population of about 200 people. At Van's insistence, Crosby continued to use her maiden name as her literary name for her compositions, but she chose to use her married name on all legal documents. However, according to Crosby biographer Edith Blumhofer: "Despite her education, her handwriting was barely legible, and on legal documents she signed her name with an X witnessed by friends".In 1859 the Van Alstynes had one daughter, Frances, who died in her sleep soon after birth. While some believe the cause was typhoid fever
Typhoid fever
Typhoid fever, also known as Typhoid, is a common worldwide bacterial disease, transmitted by the ingestion of food or water contaminated with the feces of an infected person, which contain the bacterium Salmonella enterica, serovar Typhi...
, Darlene Neptune speculates that it was SIDS
Sudden infant death syndrome
Sudden infant death syndrome is marked by the sudden death of an infant that is unexpected by medical history, and remains unexplained after a thorough forensic autopsy and a detailed death scene investigation. An infant is at the highest risk for SIDS during sleep, which is why it is sometimes...
, and that Crosby's hymn, "Safe in the Arms of Jesus" was inspired by her daughter's death.
After the death of their daughter, Van became increasingly reclusive, and Crosby never spoke publicly about being a mother, only mentioning it in a few interviews toward the end of her life, when she said: "Now I am going to tell you of something that only my closest friends know. I became a mother and knew a mother's love. God gave us a tender babe but the angels came down and took our infant up to God and to His throne".
Manhattan (1859-1896)
In addition to Crosby's income as a poet and lyricist, Van played the organ at two churches in New York city, and gave private music lessons. Although Crosby and Van could have lived comfortably on their combined income, Crosby "had other priorities and gave away anything that was not necessary to their daily survival". Crosby and Van also organized concerts, with half the proceeds given to aid the poor, in which Crosby gave recitations of her poems and sang and Van Alstyne played various instruments. While Van Alstyne provided the music for some of her poetry, Crosby indicated that "his taste was mostly for the wordless melodies of the classics". The Van Alstynes collaborated on the production of a hymnal featuring only hymns written by them, but it was rejected by Biglow and Main, ostensibly because the directors believed the public would not buy a hymnal featuring only two composers, but probably due to the complexity of the melodies.
In 1874 Crosby was reported to be "living in a destitute condition".
Separation (1880-1902)
For many years the Van Alstynes had "a most unusual married life", and lived together only in intermittently. By 1880 Crosby and her husband had separated, with them living both separately and independently due to a rift in their marriage of uncertain origin. At one point soon after, she moved to a "dismal flat" at 9 Frankfort Street, near one of Manhattan's worst slums in the Lower East Side. Thereafter, she lived at several different addresses in and around Manhattan.Blumhofer suggests their estrangement was because Van denied Crosby the romantic love she desired due to the effect of the death of their daughter in 1859, and because their housing choices offered them little privacy. Others suggest the separation was the result of in the increase of Crosby's outside interests, including writing hymns and rescue work.
Van Alstyne rarely accompanied Crosby when she travelled, and she vacationed without him. Despite living separately for more than two decades, Crosby insisted that they "maintained an amiable relationship", kept in contact with one another, and even ministered together on occasions in this period. For example, on June 15, 1895 in Yonkers, New York
Yonkers, New York
Yonkers is the fourth most populous city in the state of New York , and the most populous city in Westchester County, with a population of 195,976...
, Van Alstyne played a piano solo, and Crosby read an ode
Ode
Ode is a type of lyrical verse. A classic ode is structured in three major parts: the strophe, the antistrophe, and the epode. Different forms such as the homostrophic ode and the irregular ode also exist...
to Captain John Underhill
Captain John Underhill
John Underhill was an early English settler and soldier in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the Province of New Hampshire, the New Haven Colony, New Netherland, and later the Province of New York...
, the progenitor of the American branch of the Underhill family, at the third annual reunion of the Underhill Society of America. Crosby's only recorded admission of marital unhappiness was in 1903, when she commented on her late husband in Will Carleton
Will Carleton
William McKendree Carleton was an American poet. Carleton's poems were most often about his rural life.-Early years:...
's This is My Story: "He had his faults — and so have I mine, but notwithstanding these, we loved each other to the last".
Brooklyn (1896-1900)
In 1896 Crosby moved from Manhattan to an apartment in a poor section of Brooklyn, living with friends at South Third Street, Brooklyn, near the home of Ira D. SankeyIra D. Sankey
Ira D. Sankey , known as The Sweet Singer of Methodism, was an American gospel singer and composer, associated with evangelist Dwight L...
and his wife, Fannie, and near the mansion owned by Phoebe Knapp.
Career in writing hymns (1864-1915)
Referring to Crosby's songs, the Dictionary of American Religious Biography indicated: "by modern standards her work may be considered mawkish or too sentimental. But their simple, homey appeal struck a responsive chord in Victorian culture
Victorian America
The Victorian Era is a name for the period from 1837 to 1901, the length of the rule of Britain's Queen Victoria. American Victorianism was an offshoot of this period and lifestyle that occurred in the United States, chiefly in heavily populated regions such as New England and the Deep South...
. Their informal ballad
Ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the 19th century and used extensively across Europe and later the Americas, Australia and North Africa. Many...
style broke away from the staid, formal approach of earlier periods, touching deep emotions in singers and listeners alike. Instead of dismissing her words as maudlin or saccharine, audiences thrilled to them as the essence of genuine, heartfelt Christianity". Crosby's hymns were popular because they placed "a heightened emphasis on religious experiences, emotions, and testimonies" and relected "a sentimental, romanticized relationship between the believer and Christ", rather than using the negative descriptions of earlier hymns that emphasised the sinfulness of people.
Ann Douglas argues that Crosby was one of the female authors who "emasculated American religion" and helped shift it from "a rigorous Calvinism" to "an anti-intellectual and sentimental mass culture". Feminist scholars have suggested that "emphases in her hymns both revealed and accelerated the feminizing of American evangelicalism".
Her hymns were published by many notable publishers and publishing companies:
- William B. Bradbury published her hymns in his Golden Censer (1864), a book of Sunday School hymns that sold three million copies.
- The successors to Bradbury's publishing company, Biglow and Main; for several years Crosby was under contract to write three hymns a week for Biglow and Main, and by 1889, it was estimated that Crosby had written over 2500 hymns for Bradbury, and Biglow and Main. In total, Biglow and Main purchased 5900 poems from her for use in the Sunday SchoolSunday schoolSunday school is the generic name for many different types of religious education pursued on Sundays by various denominations.-England:The first Sunday school may have been opened in 1751 in St. Mary's Church, Nottingham. Another early start was made by Hannah Ball, a native of High Wycombe in...
publications, and published nearly 2,000 of them, and provided her a regular allowance in her later years until her death. - Methodist song publisher Philip Phillips, for whom Crosby wrote a cycle of forty poems based on the Pilgrim's Progress, published in Phillips' 1866 hymnal The Singing Pilgrim, and the lyrics for an estimated 525 hymns.
Musical and lyrical collaborators
Howard Doane was an industrialist who became Crosby’s principal collaborator in writing gospel music, composing melodies for an estimated 1,500 Crosby's lyrics. Doane and Crosby collaborated through Biglow and Main, and also privately through Doane's Northern BaptistAmerican Baptist Churches USA
The American Baptist Churches USA is a Baptist Christian denomination within the United States. The denomination maintains headquarters in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. The organization is usually considered mainline, although varying theological and mission emphases may be found among its...
endeavors. Eventually Crosby entrusted to Doane the business aspects of her compositions.
In early 1868 Crosby met millionaire Methodist Phoebe Palmer Knapp
Phoebe Knapp
Phoebe Knapp was a composer of music for hymns and an organist.Knapp was born in New York City. Her parents were Walter C. Palmer and Phoebe Worrall Palmer...
, who was married to Joseph Fairchild Knapp, co-founder of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. The Knapps published hymnals initially for use in the Sunday School of the St. John's Methodist Episcopal Church in Brooklyn, which was superintended by Joseph F. Knapp for 22 years, while Phoebe Knapp took responsibility for 200 children in the infants' department. They first collaborated on Notes of Joy, the first hymnal edited by Knapp, who also contributed 94 of the 172 tunes, and published by her brother Walter C. Palmer, Jr. in 1869. Of the 21 hymns Crosby contributed to Notes of Joy, including eight as "The Children's Friend", Knapp provided the music for fourteen of them. Their best-known collaboration was "Blessed Assurance
Blessed Assurance
"Blessed Assurance" is a well-known Christian hymn. The lyrics were written in 1873 by blind hymn writer Fanny J. Crosby to the music written in 1873 by Phoebe P. Knapp.-History:...
", for which Crosby wrote words in the Knapps' music room for a tune written by Knapp, while Crosby was staying at the Knapp Mansion in 1873.
From 1871 to 1908, Crosby worked with Ira Sankey, who helped make her "a household name to Protestants around the world". While Sankey was "the premier promoter" of gospel songs, "Crosby ranked first as their provider". The evangelistic team of Sankey and Dwight L. Moody
Dwight L. Moody
Dwight Lyman Moody , also known as D.L. Moody, was an American evangelist and publisher who founded the Moody Church, Northfield School and Mount Hermon School in Massachusetts , the Moody Bible Institute and Moody Publishers.-Early life:Dwight Moody was born in Northfield, Massachusetts to a large...
brought many of Crosby's hymns to the attention of Christians throughout the United States and Britain. Crosby was close friends with Sankey and his wife, Frances, and often stayed with them at their home in Northfield, Massachusetts
Northfield, Massachusetts
Northfield is a town in Franklin County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 2,951 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area...
from 1886 for the annual summer Christian Workers' Conferences, and later in their Brooklyn. After Sankey's eyesight was destroyed by glaucoma
Glaucoma
Glaucoma is an eye disorder in which the optic nerve suffers damage, permanently damaging vision in the affected eye and progressing to complete blindness if untreated. It is often, but not always, associated with increased pressure of the fluid in the eye...
in March 1903, their friendship deepened and they often continued to compose hymns together at Sankey's harmonium
Harmonium
A harmonium is a free-standing keyboard instrument similar to a reed organ. Sound is produced by air being blown through sets of free reeds, resulting in a sound similar to that of an accordion...
in his home.
Crosby's process
Crosby described her hymn-writing process: 'It may seem a little old-fashioned, always to begin one's work with prayer, but I never undertake a hymn without first asking the good Lord to be my inspiration.' Her capacity for work was incredible and often she would compose six or seven hymns a day. Her poems and hymns were composed entirely in her mind and she worked on as many as twelve hymns at once before dictating them to an amenuensus. On one occasion Crosby composed 40 hymns before they were transcribed. Her lyrics would usually be transcribed by Alexander Van Alstyne, or later by her half-sister Carolyn "Carrie" Ryder or her secretary Eva C. Cleaveland, as Crosby herself could write little more than her name. While Crosby had musical training, she did not compose the melody for most of her lyrics. In fact, in 1903 Crosby claimed that "Spring Hymn" was the only hymn she wrote both the words and music. In 1906 Crosby composed both the words and music for "The Blood-Washed Throng", which was published and copyrighted by gospel singer Mary Upham Currier, who was a distant cousin who had been a well-known concert singer.In 1921 Edward S. Ninde wrote: "None would claim that she was a poetess in any large sense. Her hymns ... have been severely criticised. Dr. Julian, the editor of the Dictionary of Hymnology, says that 'they are, with few exceptions, very weak and poor,' and others insist that they are 'crudely sentimental.' Some hymn books will give them no place whatever". According to Glimpses of Christian History, Crosby's "hymns have sometimes been criticized as 'gushy and mawkishly sentimental' and critics have often attacked both her writing and her theology. The fact remains, however, that she has exerted an enormous influence on American hymnody, and some of her hymns are still cherished by believers today. Although thousands of her hymns have faded into obscurity over the years, they nevertheless were meaningful to her contemporaries, speaking to their lives and expressing their devotion to God. As fellow hymn writer George C. Stebbins stated, 'There was probably no writer in her day who appealed more to the valid experience of the Christian life or who expressed more sympathetically the deep longings of the human heart than Fanny Crosby.' And many of her hymns have stood the test of time, still resonating with believers today".
"Rescue the perishing"
While Crosby will probably always be best known for her hymns, she wanted to be seen primarily as a rescue mission worker. According to Keith Schwanz: "At the end of her life, Fanny’s concept of her vocation was not that of a celebrated gospel songwriter, but that of a city mission worker. In an interview that was published in the March 24, 1908, issue of the New Haven Register, Fanny said that her chief occupation was working in missions. Although, according to Schwanz: "Many of Fanny’s hymns emerged from her involvement in the city missions", including "More Like Jesus" (1867); "Pass Me Not, O Gentle SaviourPass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
"Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior" is a 19th-century American hymn written by Francis J. Crosby in 1868 and William H. Doane in 1870 . The hymn has been recorded by number of artists, including Reggie Houston, Cyrus Chestnut, Bill Gaither, and Lyle Lovett...
" (1868); and "Rescue the Perishing" (1869), which became the "theme song of the home missions movement", and was "perhaps the most popular city mission song", with its "wedding of personal piety and compassion for humanity". Crosby celebrated the rescue mission movement in her 1895 hymn, "The Rescue Band".
As Crosby had lived for decades in such areas of New York City as Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
Hell's Kitchen, also known as Clinton and Midtown West, is a neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City between 34th Street and 59th Street, from 8th Avenue to the Hudson River....
, The Bowery, and The Tenderloin
Tenderloin, Manhattan
The Tenderloin was an entertainment and red-light district in the heart of the New York City borough of Manhattan during the late 19th and early 20th centuries...
, she was aware personally of the great needs of immigrants and the urban poor, and was passionate to help those around her through urban rescue missions and other compassionate ministry organizations. Crosby indicated "from the time I received my first check for my poems, I made up my mind to open my hand wide to those who needed assistance". Throughout her life, Crosby was described as having "a horror of wealth", never set prices to speak, often refused honoraria, and "what little she did accept she gave away almost as soon as she got it". After her marriage, Crosby "had other priorities and gave away anything that was not necessary to their daily survival". The Van Alstynes also organized concerts, with half the proceeds given to aid the poor. Throughout New York City, Crosby's sympathies for the poor were well-known, but consisted primarily of indirect involvement by giving contributions from the sale of her poems, and by writing and sending poems for special occasions for these missions to the dispossessed, as well as sporadic visits to those missions.
Rescue missions (1865-1880)
Among those Crosby supported was the American Female Guardian Society and Home for the Friendless (founded in 1834) at 29 East 29th Street, for whom she wrote a hymn in 1865 that was sung by some of the Home's children:- O, no, we are not friendless now,
- For God hath reared a home.
"More Like Jesus Would I Be", her first hymn written for Doane in June 1867, expressly for the sixth anniversary of the Howard Mission and Home for Little Wanderers, a nondenominational mission at New Bowery, Manhattan.
After speaking at a service at the Manhattan prison
The Tombs
"The Tombs" is the colloquial name for the Manhattan Detention Complex, a jail in Lower Manhattan at 125 White Street, as well as the popular name of a series of preceding downtown jails, the first of which was built in 1838 in the Egyptian Revival style of architecture.The nickname has been used...
in spring 1868, Crosby was inspired to write "Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
Pass Me Not, O Gentle Saviour
"Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior" is a 19th-century American hymn written by Francis J. Crosby in 1868 and William H. Doane in 1870 . The hymn has been recorded by number of artists, including Reggie Houston, Cyrus Chestnut, Bill Gaither, and Lyle Lovett...
" after comments by some prisoners for the Lord not to pass them by, with Doane setting it to music and publishing it in Songs of Devotion in 1870. "Pass Me Not" became her first hymn to have global appeal, after it was used by Ira Sankey in is crusades with Moody in Britain in 1874. Sankey said, "No hymn was more popular at the meetings in London in 1875 [sic] than this one.
In April 1868 Crosby wrote "Fifty Years Ago" for the semi-centennial of the New-York Port Society, which was founded in 1818 "for the promotion of the Gospel among the seamen in the Port of New-York".
By July 1869 Crosby was attending at least weekly meetings organized by the interdenominational New York City Mission, After a young man was converted through her testimony, Crosby was inspired to write the words for "Rescue the Perishing" based on a title and a tune given to her by William Howard Doane
William Howard Doane
William Howard Doane was an industrialist who composed Christian hymn tunes. He held patents on wood-working machinery and in 1861 became President of J. A. Fay and Company. In religious work he headed the Ohio Baptist Convention Ministers Aid Society for the Midwest...
a few days earlier. In his 1907 book My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns, Ira Sankey recalled the origins of "Rescue the Perishing":
Fanny Crosby returned, one day, from a visit to a mission in one of the worst districts in New York City, where she had heard about the needs of the lost and perishing. Her sympathies were aroused to help the lowly and neglected, and the cry of her heart went forth in this hymn, which has become a battle-cryBattle cryA battle cry is a yell or chant taken up in battle, usually by members of the same military unit.Battle cries are not necessarily articulate, although they often aim to invoke patriotic or religious sentiment....
for the great army of Christian workers throughout the world. It is been used very extensively in temperance work, and has been blessed to thousands of souls.
Rescue missions (1880-1900)
In 1880, at the age of sixty, Crosby "made a new commitment to Christ to serve the poor", and to devote the rest of her life to home missionary work. Crosby continued to live in a dismal flat at 9 Frankfort Street, near one of the worst slums in Manhattan, until about 1884. From this time Crosby increased her involvement in various missions and homes. During the next three decades, Crosby would dedicate her time as "Aunty Fanny" to work at various city rescue missions, including the McAuley Water Street MissionWater Street Mission
The Water Street Mission was the first rescue mission to open in the United States. It was started by Jerry McAuley in 1872....
, the Bowery Mission
Bowery Mission
The Bowery Mission is a rescue mission in Manhattan's Bowery that was started in 1879 by Albert Gleason Ruliffson. It was the third rescue mission established in the United States.The Mission gives homeless men a place to sleep overnight.-History:...
, the Howard Mission, the Cremore Mission, the Door of Hope, and other skid row
Skid row
A skid row or skid road is a run-down or dilapidated urban area with a large, impoverished population. The term originally referred literally to a path along which working men skidded logs. Its current sense appears to have originated in the Pacific Northwest...
missions. Additionally, Crosby spoke at YMCA
YMCA
The Young Men's Christian Association is a worldwide organization of more than 45 million members from 125 national federations affiliated through the World Alliance of YMCAs...
s, churches, and prisons about the needs of the urban poor. Additionally, Crosby was a passionate supporter of Frances Willard
Frances Willard (suffragist)
Frances Elizabeth Caroline Willard was an American educator, temperance reformer, and women's suffragist. Her influence was instrumental in the passage of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution...
and the Women's Christian Temperance Union and its endeavors to urge either abstinence or moderation in the use of alcohol. For example, before 1879 Crosby wrote the words for the song "The Red Pledge", which advocated total abstinence from imbibing alcohol.
Water Street Mission (1880)
From about 1880, Crosby attended and supported the Helping Hand for Men (better known as the Water Street MissionWater Street Mission
The Water Street Mission was the first rescue mission to open in the United States. It was started by Jerry McAuley in 1872....
), "America's first rescue mission", in Manhattan, which was founded to minister to alcoholics and the unemployed by a former prostitute, Maria
Maria McAuley
Maria McAuley , along with her husband Jerry, founded the McAuley Water St Mission in New York City. Self-described as "river thief" and "fallen woman", respectively, Jerry and Maria McAuleys' Mission became America's first rescue mission, and is now known as the New York City Rescue Mission...
and Jeremiah "Jerry" McAuley
Jerry McAuley
Jerry McAuley , along with his wife, Maria, was the founder of the McAuley Water Street Mission in New York City...
, a former alcoholic, thief, and convict who had become a Christian in Sing Sing
Sing Sing
Sing Sing Correctional Facility is a maximum security prison operated by the New York State Department of Correctional Services in the town of Ossining, New York...
prison in 1864. Crosby often attended the Water Street Mission, "conversing and counseling with those she met".
Bowery Mission (1881)
Bowery Mission
The Bowery Mission is a rescue mission in Manhattan's Bowery that was started in 1879 by Albert Gleason Ruliffson. It was the third rescue mission established in the United States.The Mission gives homeless men a place to sleep overnight.-History:...
in Manhattan. As the Bowery Mission welcomed the ministry of women, Crosby worked actively at the Mission, often attending and speaking in the evening meetings.
Each year until the building was razed in a fire in 1897, Crosby addressed the large crowds attending the anniversary service, where she would also recite one of her poems written for the occasion, many of which were set to music by Victor Benke, the Mission's volunteer organist from 1893 to 1897. Among the songs Crosby and Benke collaborated on were six songs published in 1901: "He Has Promised", "There's a Chorus Ever Ringing", "God Bless Our School Today", "Is There Something I Can Do?", "On Joyful Wings", and "Keep On Watching".
Cremorne Mission (1882)
When Jerry and Maria McAuley started the Cremorne Mission in 1882, in the Cremorne Garden, at 104 West 32nd Street, as a "beachhead in a vast jungle of vice and debauchery known as Tenderloin" (near Sixth Avenue), Crosby also began supporting this new mission. Crosby attended the nightly 8.00 pm services, where gospel songs written by her and Doane were often sung, including "ballads recalling mother's prayers, reciting the evils of intemperance, or envisioning agonizing deathbed scenes intending to arouse long-buried memories and strengthen resolves". After the death of Jerry McAuley in 1884, Crosby was inspired to write a prayer later included in rescue song books:- Lord, behold in Thy compassion
- Those who kneel before Thee now;
- They are in a sad condition
- None can help them, Lord, but Thou.
- They are lost, but do not leave them
- In their dreary path to roam;
- There is pardon, precious pardon
- If to Thee by faith they come.
After McAuley's death, Crosby continued to support the Cremorne Mission, now led by Samuel Hopkins Hadley.
Door of Hope (1890)
Of the several city missions with which Crosby worked, some were operated by proponents of Wesleyan/Holiness doctrine, including the Door of Hope rescue home founded on October 25, 1890, in a house belonging to A.B. Simpson, to be "a refuge and a home for girls of the better class who have been tempted from home and right", and to rescue "fallen girls" by socialite Emma Whittemore.Later years (1900-1915)
Though her hymn writing declined in later years, Crosby was active in speaking engagements and missionary work among America's urban poor almost until she died. Crosby was very well known during her time and often met with presidents, generals, and other dignitaries. According to Blumhofer, "The popularity of Fanny Crosby's lyrics as well as her winsome personality catapulted her to fame".By May 1900 Crosby had been ill with a serious heart condition for a few months, and still showed some effects from a fall, which prompted her half-sisters to travel to Brooklyn to convince her to move from her room in the home of poet Will Carleton
Will Carleton
William McKendree Carleton was an American poet. Carleton's poems were most often about his rural life.-Early years:...
in Brooklyn, New York to Bridgeport, Connecticut, to live with Julia "Jule" Athington, her widowed half-sister and Jule's widowed younger sister, Caroline "Carrie" W. Rider. Soon after Crosby and Rider rented a room together, before both moving to a rented apartment, where they lived until 1906.
After moving to Bridgeport, Crosby usually attended the First Methodist Church. Crosby was also involved actively with the Salvation Army
Salvation Army
The Salvation Army is a Protestant Christian church known for its thrift stores and charity work. It is an international movement that currently works in over a hundred countries....
, and the Christian Union rescue mission, often attending the nightly services, and frequently giving a gospel message through her poems and prose. In 1904 Crosby formally transferred her church membership from Cornell Memorial Methodist Church in Manhattan to the First Methodist Church of Bridgeport.
On July 18, 1902, Crosby's husband, Alexander van Alstyne, who was living with Caroline and David Harris Underhill
Underhill Burying Ground
The Underhill Burying Ground is a cemetery located within the Village of Lattingtown, in the Town of Oyster Bay in Nassau County, New York. The cemetery has been in continuous operation since the burial of Captain John Underhill in 1672.-Origins and history:...
in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, died. Fearing for Crosby's health, William Doane and her publishers, Biglow and Main, convinced Crosby not to travel to New York City at that time. Phoebe Knapp paid for his burial, but not a gravestone, at Mt. Olivet Cemetery.
Carleton controversy (1904-1905)
Some of Crosby's wealthy friends, like Phoebe Knapp, Doane, and Sankey, contributed often to her financial needs, although Crosby still tended to give generously to those she saw as less fortunate than herself. Even after Crosby submitted fewer lyrics to them, The Biglow and Main Company, Crosby's long-time publisher, paid her a small stipend of $8 each week in recognition of her contributions to their business over the years. However, Phoebe Knapp and others believed Biglow and Main had made enormous profits because of Crosby without compensating her adequately for her contributions, and that she should be living more comfortably in her advanced years.Another wealthy friend of Crosby was popular American poet, author, and lecturer Will Carleton, with whom Crosby had lived in her last years in Brooklyn, and who had been giving lectures on Crosby's hymns and life, and had published a series of articles on Crosby in his Every Where magazine (which had a peak circulation of 50,000 copies a month) in 1901, for which he paid her $10 an article. In 1902 Carleton wrote a tribute to Crosby that was published in his Songs of Two Centures.
At Knapp's instigation, Carleton revised those articles and wrote Fanny Crosby's Life-Story, a biography authorized initially by Crosby, which was published by July 1903, and reviewed favorably by The New York Times on July 25. Carleton's book sold for $1 a copy. This was the first full-length biographical account of Crosby's life, although Robert Lowry had written a sixteen-page biographical sketch that was published in 1897 in her last book of poems, Bells of Evening and Other Verses. In the advertisement at the front of the book, the following statement from "the author" was signed with a facsimile of Crosby's signature: "'Fanny Crosby's Life-Story' is published and sold for my benefit, and I hope by its means to be a welcome guest in many homes". Additionally, Carleton wrote:
It is sincerely hoped by the publishers of this book may have as large a sale as possible, in order that the story of the its loved author may be an inspiration to many people, and that she may be enabled to have a home of her own, in which to pass the remainder of her days.
According to Ruffin, Carleton's book "went over like a lead balloon with Fanny's publishers", although there was nothing negative written explicitly about Biglow and Main, but also little praise for the firm and its members. Croby is quoted as referring to Biglow and Main: "with whom I have maintained most cordial and even affectionate relations, for many years past". Carleton's book did not use any of Crosby's hymns owned by Biglow and Main. Hubert Main believed: "Will Carleton wanted to ignore the Biglow & Main Company and all its writers as far as possible and set himself up as the one of her friends who was helping her". Biglow and Main believed Carleton and Knapp were guilty of "a brutal attack on Fanny", and were plotting to "take over" Crosby. At the fortieth anniversary reception and dinner held in Manhattan to celebrate Crosby's association with Bradbury and Biglow and Main in February 1904, Phoebe Knapp was not invited as she was persona non grata
Persona non grata
Persona non grata , literally meaning "an unwelcome person", is a legal term used in diplomacy that indicates a proscription against a person entering the country...
at Biglow and Main.
Biglow and Main, who were concerned that this book would diminish sales of Crosby's Bells at Evening and Other Verses, which they had published in 1897, and which contained Lowry's biographical sketch of Crosby, and through Doane convinced Crosby to write to both Carleton and Knapp, as well as a letter to The New York Times and also to threaten to sue Carelton in April 1904 for an accounting of the sales of the book for which she was promised 10 cents a copy royalties, and seeking an injunction
Injunction
An injunction is an equitable remedy in the form of a court order that requires a party to do or refrain from doing certain acts. A party that fails to comply with an injunction faces criminal or civil penalties and may have to pay damages or accept sanctions...
to prevent its continued publication as she believed Carelton misrepresented her by describing her to be in poor health and living alone in extreme poverty, whereas she was receiving $25 a week income from Biglow and Main, and living with relatives who cared for her. Crosby indicated she had no desire to be a homeowner, and that if she was ever living in poverty, it was her choice.
In response to Crosby's letter and threats of a lawsuit, Carleton wrote in an open letter to The New York Times on April 7, 1904, that he was motivated to write his "labor of love" for Crosby in order to raise money that she might have a home of her own for the first time in her life; that he had interviewed Crosby and transcribed the details of her life; had paid her for her time and materials; had secured her permission to publish the material in his magazine Every Where, and in a book; had paid all the expenses for publishing and printing out of his own pocket; had promoted the book in his own time and at his own expense; and had remitted to her $235.20 for the royalties owing for the previous eight months at the agreed rate, and had sent additional contributions given by admirers at his lectures to her. Sankey, who paid the rent on the Bridgeport house where Crosby lived with her half-sister Carrie, implied in an article in The Christian that "the Carleton business had been of Satanic origin and commented, echoing the wheat and tares passage in scripture, 'An enemy hath done this'".
In 1904 Knapp contacted Methodist Episcopal Church Bishop Charles Cardwell McCabe
Charles Cardwell McCabe
Charles Cardwell McCabe was an American who distinguished himself as a Methodist pastor, an Army chaplain during the American Civil War, a Church executive chiefly in the field of fundraising, as Chancellor of American University, and as a Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church , elected in...
and enlisted his assistance in publicising Crosby's poverty and raising funds to ameliorate that situation. After securing Crosby's permission to solicit funds for her benefit, in June 1904 the religious press (including The Christian Advocate), carried McCabe's request for money for Crosby under the heading "Fanny Crosby in Need". McCabe indicated that "her hymns have never been copyrighted in her own name, she has sold them for small sums to the publishers who hold the copyright themselves, and the gifted authoress has but little monetary reward for hymns that have been sung all over the world". By July 1904 newspapers reported that Crosby's publishers had issued a statement denying Crosby was in need of funds, and indicated she never would be "as they have provided abundantly for her during her entire life", and that "Bishop McCabe, who issued an appeal for assistance for Miss Crosby has been grossly deceived by somebody". In response to Bishop McCabe's fundraising on her behalf, Crosby also wrote a letter to him which was published at her instigation, which permitted him to solicit funds from her friends as "a testimonial of their love", but reiterated that she was not living in poverty, nor was she dying or in poor health. After Crosby and her representatives contacted him, a week later, McCabe wrote to The Christian Advocate explaining his rationale for raising funds for Crosby, but that he was now withdrawing the appeal at her request.
In July 1904, the matter was still not settled, however it came to an end before Fanny Crosby Day in March 1905, after Carleton's wife, Adora Niles Goodell Carleton, died suddenly.
In 1905 Carleton issued a new edition of Fannie Crosby, Her Life Work, which was both expanded and "newly illustrated", and despite "the greater expense of production, the price remains One Dollar a copy", with Crosby to "receive the same liberal royalty", as the book was "SOLD FOR THE BLIND AUTHOR'S BENEFIT". In December 1905 Crosby issued a card protesting the continued sale of Carleton's book, again denying she was "in distress", as she was in "comfortable circumstances and very active", giving lectures at leat once a week. Crosby indicated she had received less than $325 from the sale of the book, that her "requests had been disregarded", but that "when these facts are fully known to all, the publishers can sell the book as they desire; only I have no wish to increase its sale for my own benefit, which, of course, is very small".
Despite Crosby's efforts, Carleton still advertised the book for sale in his Every Where magazine every year until at least 1911. In 1911 Carleton serialised and updated Crosby's life story in Every Where. The 1906 publication of Crosby's own autobiography, Memories of Eighty Years, which, in contrast to Carleton's book focused on Crosby's hymn-writing years, was sold by subscription and door-to-door, and promoted in lectures by Doane, raised $1,000 for Crosby.
For a period Crosby and Knapp were estranged in their relationship because of the Carleton book, with Knapp even travelling to Bridgeport to give Crosby "a big blowing up and put Fanny on her back". Knapp also wrote Crosby two letters "threatening heavy damages if Crosby sued either her or Carleton". Despite these developments, by early 1905 the "tempest passed", with Crosby and Knapp reconciled.
Fanny Crosby Day (1905)
On Sunday, March 26, 1905, Fanny Crosby Day was celebrated in churches of many denominations around the world, with special worship services in honor of her 85th birthday, two days earlier. On that day Crosby attended the First Baptist Church in Bridgeport where Carrie Rider was a member, and spoke in the evening service, and was given $85.Because of Carrie Rider's cancer, in summer 1906 Crosby and Rider moved to 226 Wells Street, Bridgeport, Connecticut. Carrie died of intestinal cancer in July 1907.
On July 10, 1908, Phoebe Knapp died. Weeks later, Ira Sankey died having just sang "Saved by Grace", one of Crosby's most popular compositions.
On May 2, 1911, Crosby spoke to 5000 people at the opening meeting of the Evangelistic Committee's seventh annual campaign held in Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
, after the crowd sang her songs for thirty minutes. On her 94th birthday in March 1914, Alice Rector and the King's Daughters of the First Methodist Church of Bridgeport, Connecticut organized a Violet Day to honor Crosby, which was publicised nationally by Hugh Main.
Death and legacy
After a six-month illness, Crosby died of arterio sclerosisAtherosclerosis
Atherosclerosis is a condition in which an artery wall thickens as a result of the accumulation of fatty materials such as cholesterol...
and a cerebral hemorrhage on February 12, 1915 at Bridgeport. She was buried at the Mountain Grove Cemetery
Mountain Grove Cemetery, Bridgeport
Mountain Grove Cemetery, Bridgeport, Connecticut, was laid out in 1849 in a park-like, rural setting away from the center of the city.The cemetery was designed by P. T. Barnum, who himself is buried there.-Notable interments:...
in Bridgeport, near to her mother and other members of her family. At Crosby's request, her family erected a very small tombstone, which carried the words: "Aunt Fanny: She hath done what she could; Fanny J. Crosby".
In March 1925, about 3000 churches throughout the United States observed Fanny Crosby Day to commemorate the 105th anniversary of her birth.
Fanny Crosby Memorial Home for the Aged (1925-1996)
Crosby left money in her will for "the sheltering of senior males who had no other place to live, with these men to pay a nominal fee to the home for their living expenses". In 1923 the King's Daughters of the First Methodist Church of Bridgeport, Connecticut honored Crosby's request to memorialize her by beginning to raise the additional funds needed to establish the Fanny Crosby Memorial Home for the Aged. The nondenominational home was established in the former Hunter house at 1008 Fairfield Avenue, Bridgeport, Connecticut, and opened on November 1, 1925, after a national drive by the Federation of Churches to raise $100,000 to operate it. It operated until 1996 when it was given to the Bridgeport Rescue Mission.On Monday October 8, 1934, the Enoch Crosby chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution
Daughters of the American Revolution
The Daughters of the American Revolution is a lineage-based membership organization for women who are descended from a person involved in United States' independence....
dedicated an historic roadside marker commemorating the birthplace of Crosby on the western side of Route 22, in Doanesburg, New York.
Despite her specific instructions not to erect a large marble monument, on May 1, 1955, a large memorial stone that "dwarfed the original gravestone" was dedicated by Crosby's "friends to whom her life was an inspiration". It contained the first stanza of "Blessed Assurance
Blessed Assurance
"Blessed Assurance" is a well-known Christian hymn. The lyrics were written in 1873 by blind hymn writer Fanny J. Crosby to the music written in 1873 by Phoebe P. Knapp.-History:...
".
Other honors
Crosby was inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of FameGospel Music Hall of Fame
The Gospel Music Hall of Fame, created in 1971 by the Gospel Music Association, is a Hall of Fame dedicated exclusively to recognizing meaningful contributions by individuals and groups in all forms of gospel music.-Inductees:...
in 1975.
During 2010 the songwriter George Hamilton IV
George Hamilton IV
George Hege Hamilton IV is an American country musician. He began performing in the late 1950s as a teen idol, later switching to country music in the early 1960s.-Biography:Hamilton was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina...
undertook a tour of Methodist chapels celebrating Fanny's outstanding contribution to gospel music. His presentation included stories of her productive and charitable life, some of her hymns and a few of his own uplifting songs.
Crosby is honored with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America
Calendar of saints (Episcopal Church in the United States of America)
The veneration of saints in the Episcopal Church is a continuation of an ancient tradition from the early Church which honors important people of the Christian faith. The usage of the term "saint" is similar to Roman Catholic and Orthodox traditions. Those in the Anglo-Catholic tradition may...
on February 11.
Articles and chapters
- Artman, William and Lansing V. Hall, "Miss Frances Jane Crosby", 168-179. In Beauties and Achievements of the Blind. Published for the Authors, 1854.
- Bowden, Henry Warner. "Crosby, Frances Jane", 131-132. In Dictionary of American Religious Biography. 2nd ed. Greenwood Publishing Group, 1993.
- Bradbury, Woodman. "Fanny Crosby". In Heroines of Modern Religion, 115-133. Edited by Warren Dunham Foster. Sturgis, 1913.
- Brown, George William. "One Hundred Years of Fanny Crosby", 371ff. The Continent (March 18, 1920).
- Crawford, Richard. "George Frederick Root (1820-1895) and American Vocal Music", 151ff. In The American Musical Landscape: The Business of Muscianship from Billings to Gershwin. University of California Press, 2000.
- Elbin, Paul E. "Fanny Crosby and William H. Doane Have Had Their Day". The Hymn 21 (January 1970):12-16.
- "Frances Jane Van Alstyne: Poet and Hymn Writer". In The National Cyclopædia of American Biography, Vol. 7. New York, NY: James T. White & Company, 1897.
- Grattan, Virginia L. "Crosby, Frances 'Fanny' (1820-1915)", 207-209. In American Women Songwriters: A Biographical Dictionary. Greenwood Press, 1993.
- Hall, Nancy E. "'And giveth me songs in the night': Gospel Hymn Author Fanny Crosby", Whole Earth Review (Spring, 1993).
- Hartsock, Ralph. "Crosby, Frances Jane "Fanny" (1820–1915)", 192-193. In Women in the American Civil War, Vol. 2. Edited by Lisa Tendrich Frank. ABC-CLIO, 2008.
- Hobbs, June Hadden. "His Religion and Hers in Nineteenth Century Hymnody", 120-144. In Nineteenth-century Women Learn to Write. Edited by Catherine Hobbs. University of Virginia Press, 1995.
- McNeil, W.K. "Root, George Frederick", 324-325. In Encyclopedia of American Gospel Music. Edited by W. K. McNeil. Routledge, 2005.
- Sawyer, Mrs. C.M. "A Visit to the Institution for the Blind". In Universalist Union 7. (P. Price, 1842):397-399.
- Stulz, Marie. "Two Cantatas by George Frederick Root: A Nineteenth Century American Composer with Massachusetts Roots". Choral Excellence for Treble Voices. 2005.
- Wilhoff, Mel R. "Crosby, Fanny Jane", 91-92. In Encyclopedia of American Gospel Music. Edited by W. K. McNeil. Routledge, 2005.
- Willard, Frances Elizabeth and Mary Ashton Rice Livermore. "Crosby, Fanny J.", 217f. In American Women: Fifteen Hundred Biographies with over 1,400 Portraits: A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of the Lives and Achievements of American Women During the Nineteenth Century, Vol. 1 .Mast, Crowell & Kirkpatrick, 1897.
Dissertations and theses
- Albertson, Wayne Frederick. (1991) "Narcissism and Destiny: A Study of the Life and Work of Fanny J. Crosby". Ph.D. dissertation. Princeton Theological Seminary. Princeton, NJ.
- Danner, John Howard. (1989) "The Hymns of Fanny Crosby and the Search for Assurance: Theology in a Different Key". Ph.D. dissertation. Boston, MA: Boston University.
Biographies
- Casswell, John Reginald. (1939) Fanny Crosby: The Sightless Songstress, Author of 8000 Hymns. Pickering & Inglis.
- Davis, Rebecca. (2003) Fanny Crosby: Queen of Gospel Songs. Journeyforth.
- Dengler, Sandy. (1985) Fanny Crosby: Writer of 8,000 Songs. Chicago, IL: Moody Press.
- Jackson, S. Trevena. (1912) An Evening of Song and Story with Fanny J. Crosby. New York and Chicago: The Biglow & Main Co.
- Jackson, Samuel Trevena. (1915) Fanny Crosby's Story of Ninety-four Years: Retold by S. Trevena Jackson. New York: F.H. Revell.
- Loveland, John. (1978) Blessed Assurance: The Life and Hymns of Fanny J. Crosby. Broadman Press.
Other monographs
- Adamson, Lynda G. (1999) Notable Women in American History: A Guide to Recommended Biographies and Autobiographies. Greenwood Press.
- Bolton, Jacklin Talmage. (1964) Religious Influences on American Secular Cantatas, 1850-1930. University of Michigan.
- Bradley, Ian C. (1997) Abide with Me: The World of Victorian Hymns. GIA Publications.
- Burrage, Henry S. (1888) Baptist Hymn Writers and Their Hymns. Portland, ME: Brown Thurston & Co.
- Chapman, John Wilbur. (1906) S. H. Hadley of Water Street: A Miracle of Grace. New York, NY: Fleming H. Revell.
- Ewing, George W. (1977) The Well-Tempered Lyre: Songs & Verse of the Temperance Movement. Southern Methodist University Press.
- Gray, Janet. (1997) She Wields a Pen: American Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century. University of Iowa Press.
- Kent, John. (1978) Holding the Fort: Studies in Victorian Revivalism. Epworth Press.
- Long, Edwin McKean. (1876) Illustrated History of Hymns and their Authors: Facts and Incidents of the Origin, Authors, Sentiments and Singing of Hymns. 2nd ed. P.W. Ziegler.
- Mouw, Richard J. and Mark A. Noll. (2004) Wonderful Words of Life: Hymns in American Protestant History and Theology. Wm. B. Eerdmans.
- Music, David W. and Paul Akers Richardson. (2008) "I Will Sing the Wondrous Story": A History of Baptist Hymnody in North America. Mercer University Press.
- Sankey, Ira David. (1906) My Life and the Story of the Gospel Hymns and of Sacred Songs and Solos. Philadelphia, Sunday School Times Co.
- Schwanz, Keith. (1997) The Birth of a Hymn: Spiritual Biographies of 20 Hymn Writers and the Experiences That Inspired Them. Kansas City, MO: Lillenas.
- Sizer, Sandra S. (1978) Gospel Hymns and Social Religion: The Rhetoric of Nineteenth-Century Revivalism. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
- Smith, Jane Stuart, and Betty Carlson. (1997). Great Christian Hymn Writers. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books.
- Smith, Nicholas, comp. (1903) Songs from the Hearts of Women: One Hundred Famous Hymns and Their Writers. A.C. McClurg.
- Warren, James I. (1988) O For a Thousand Tongues: The History, Nature, and Influence of Music in the Methodist Tradition. Francis Asbury Press.
- Wiersbe, Warren W. (2009) 50 People Every Christian Should Know: Learning from Spiritual Giants of the Faith. Baker Books.
Hymnals and Song Books
- Hadley, Colonel Henry, comp. Rescue Songs. Published for the Rescue Volunteers, 1893.
- Hustad, Donald P., ed. Fanny Crosby Speaks Again: 120 Hymns. Carol Stream, IL.: Hope Publishing. Co., 1977.
- Knapp, Mrs. Jos. F. [Phoebe Palmer Knapp]. Notes of Joy for the Sabbath School, the Social Meeting and the Hour of Prayer. New York, NY: W.C. Palmer, Jr., 1869.
- Lowry, Robert, ed. Bright Jewels for the Sunday School, a new collection of Sunday School songs written expressly for this work, many of which are the latest compositions of William B. Bradbury, and have never before been published. New York, NY: Biglow & Main, 1869.
- Lowry, Robert and W. Howard Doane. Brightest and Best. New York, NY and Chicago, IL: Biglow & Main, 1875.
- Lowry, Robert; W. Howard Doane; and Ira D. Sankey. Welcome Tidings: A Collection of Sacred Songs for the Sunday School. New York, NY: Biglow & Main, 1877.
- Main, H.P., ed. The Chautauqua Collection. New York, NY: Biglow & Main Co., 1875.
- Ogden, W.A., ed. New Silver Song. Toledo, OH: W.W. Whitney, 1872.
- Perkins, Theodore E. and Alfred Taylor, eds. Songs of Salvation: Work Songs. T.E. Perkins, 1870.
- Phillips, Philip, ed. The Singing Pilgrim; or, Pilgrim's Progress Illustrated in Song, for the Sabbath School, Church, and Family. New York, NY and Cincinnati, OH: Philip Phillips & Co., 1866.
- Root, George F. The Academy Vocalist; or Vocal Music Arranged for the Use of Seminaries, High Schools, Singing Classes, Etc. New York, NY: Mason Brothers, 1852.
- [Root, George F.]. Six Songs by Wurzel. Cleveland, OH: S. Brainard’s Sons, 1855.
- Sankey, Ira D.; James McGranahan; and George C. Stebbins, eds. Gospel Hymns: Nos. 1 to 6. New York, NY: The Biglow & Main Co., 1895; Cincinnati, OH: John Church & Co., 1895.
- Sherwin, W.F. and S.J. Vail, eds. Songs of Grace and Glory for Sunday Schools. New York, NY: Horace Waters & Son, 1874.
- Stebbins, George C., ed., Fannie Crosby Memorial Song Book. Chicago, IL: Hope Publishing Co., 1917.
DVDs
- Fanny Crosby. Intercomm . 90 mins.
- The Fanny Crosby Story. Vision Video. 46 mins. Written and directed by Stephen Plitt.
Archival materials
- "Papers of Fanny Crosby", Collection 35. Wheaton, IL: Billy Graham Center Archives.Papers of Fanny Crosby - Collection 35
External links
- The New York Institute for Special Education page on Fanny Crosby
- Fanny Crosby page at the Cyber Hymnal Words, MIDI & sheet music for over 500 hymns.
- Incomplete list of Crosby compositions from 1861
- Over 2,500 Crosby hymn texts
- Music for the Nation: American Sheet Music
- Lyrics and scores of Crosby songs
- Blessed Assurance music and lyrics
- Fanny Crosby & Phoebe Knapp
- Crosby & Knapp 1909 Edison Quartet recording of "Blessed Assurance"
- List of Victor recordings of Crosby songs 1900-1925
This page originally based on public domain
Public domain
Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
information from The Cyber Hymnal