You are truly an ignorant and immoral BASTARD!!
And remember--when you're rotting in the coffin you can never take back the immoral crap you did!
REMARKS AT THE UNVEILING OF THE ROBERT INGERSOLL BUST AT THE ROBERT GREEN INGERSOLL BIRTHPLACE MUSEUM
JULY 6, 2001
The following remarks were presented by Roger Greeley, chair of the Robert Green Ingersoll Memorial Committee, and Paul Kurtz, founder and chair of the Council for Secular Humanism, on the occasion of the unveiling of a historic bust of Robert Ingersoll at the museum situated in his birthplace. In attendance were all participants in a historical conference devoted to Ingersoll that was held near Dresden at that time.
ROGER GREELEY: A little history is in order. Dowagiac, Michigan, is an obscure little town in southwestern Michigan of six thousand. The standard joke today is: “The best thing out of Dowagiac is the train.”
The train goes from Detroit to Chicago, Chicago to Detroit, and when I ride it, when we stop in Dowagiac, it is always January 25th, 1893. That is the day that Robert Green Ingersoll dedicated the gorgeous Beckwith Theatre. It was made possible through the efforts of the rather unusual nineteenth-century entrepreneur by the name of Philo D. Beckwith, a public atheist, a freethinker, a creative entrepreneur and industrialist, who was elected mayor of Dowagiac a number of times. In the gilded age, Dowagiac was an exception to most of the robber barons, in that he treated his workers with kindness and benevolence. As a freethinker he had long had a dream. He wanted to bring culture to Dowagiac. To do this, he said, “I will build the finest theatre of its size in the world.” Unfortunately, he died even before the blueprints were made. His wife and children, however, with access to his substantial legacy, fulfilled his dream. And in January of 1893 it was dedicated.
It would cost, in today’s money, a little more than two million dollars. This was a theatre that had just seven hundred and fifty seats. It had twenty-one very impressive medallions, all of them involved freethinkers of one shade or another. When I wrote my book, The Best of Robert Ingersoll, I went to Dowagiac many times and interviewed people who lived across the street from the Beckwith. Without exception, the most I could get was “I don’t know who those people were up there, but I heard they were all atheists.”
In nineteen sixty-eight the huge Beckwith medallion, just off center and at the top, bigger than the others, mysteriously fell to the street—probably an act of vandalism, for the devout for years had wanted this freethought memorial to be destroyed. There was a handful of devoted freethinkers in Dowagiac, one of whom mailed a certified check for fifty thousand dollars, for the restoration of the Beckwith Theatre and its conversion into a permanent museum. The City Council tore up the check and unanimously passed a decision to tear down the building. It turned out there was no local contractor capable of such a task. The walls were three feet thick. So ingenious was the provision for heating, it came a hundred yards underground from the Round Oak Stove Company, which had been founded by Philo D. Beckwith. So none of the theatre space was used for maintenance purposes for the furnace; it came underground.
Well, the story was that when they were lowering the medallions to the street, carefully, somehow Ingersoll was accidentally dropped and shattered upon impact. This is what everyone in Dowagiac that I interviewed said. In the spring of 2000 I received a letter from the present director of the Dowagiac Museum, where many of the Beckwith medallions that survived the demolition are now displayed. A senior citizen of Dowagiac by the name of Joseph Spadafor had come to the museum and said, “How would you like to complete your collection with the Ingersoll medallion?” No interest. He went back several years later (he’s now ninety-one—or ninety-two) and said, “I’m offering the bust to the museum. I know the owner.” No interest. But by this time the new director of the museum had met me, and she wrote me a letter. After I got over the initial shock that the bust was in existence after all I’d heard, I immediately called Joe Spadafor. I was in Florida at the time. We set up a time for me to him in Dowagiac on my return to Michigan. I met him. I walked up a long flight of stairs to an upstairs apartment. He’s nearly totally blind. And his first words to me: “Hi, I’m Joe Spadafor. I’m a freethinker, but don’t let anyone in Dowagiac know that.”
After telling me how he knew of the existence of the Ingersoll bust and where it was, we drove out to Glenwood. Glenwood—Dresden by comparison makes Glenwood look big. We got directions, because he couldn’t see anything we went to the one store in the town, the man, of course, knew everyone who lived there. And he said, “Oh yeah, Jack Ruple’s house. He’s moved to Vandalia (Michigan), but I’ll give you directions.” He did. As we drove in the driveway, this ninety-one-year-old man leapt out of my van before I had stopped and said, “There it is!” And there he was—buried up to his Adam’s apple. What little was left of the Ingersoll medallion.
What had happened was, when it fell to the pavement, the foreman turned to the then-director of the museum, in nineteen sixty-eight, and said, “What do you want me to do with that one?” And the director of the museum actually said, “Take him to the dump. He was an atheist.” Charles Jack Ruple overheard this. He was a worker for the power company that was aiding in the demolition. He went the foreman, he said, “If you don’t want that thing, can I have it?” He said, “Be my guest. Get it out of here.” It took four burly men to lift the five-hundred-pound bust of Ingersoll and put it in Jack’s truck. He drove it home, dug a hole beside his driveway, the men finally got it into the ground, and he poured about four hundred pounds’ of cement around that. Nobody was going to pick it up and run off.
You can see me the day that we found it on that picture there and a little description of the thing.
Let me now say that freethought and freethinkers owe Charles Jack Ruple a great debt of thanks, first for having the good sense in nineteen sixty-eight to take possession of the shattered medallion, and secondly for having the great generosity to present it to this museum. And when I told him that the Dowagiac people didn’t want it, I said, “But I’m very interested in the birth-place museum of Robert Ingersoll and I know they’d like it.” He said, “Well, all I ask is that when you have it there and when you have a little ceremony of dedication, please be sure that there’s a plaque or something that says that I gave it.” So you’ll see that it’s there also.
Our heartfelt thanks also go to Joe Spadafor, who brought to life this Ingersoll who was presumed dead by demolition in nineteen sixty-eight.
Now I would be more than slightly remiss if I didn’t touch upon Building Restoration Kalamazoo, who with the diamond saw removed the remainder of the cement that been all poured around the base that I hadn’t been able to get off with a sledge hammer. They also started the process of restoration.
But most importantly in the restoration are John and Valerie McCartney, owners of Spectrum Stain Glass Company, both very skilled artisans with enormous patience and great generosity, in that in his spare time between July of 2000 and June of 2001 he did the restoration. Four days before we were set to come to Dresden for the installation, the bust dropped again, but this time only a few inches. But the nose was shattered. From a picture that Valerie had of Ingersoll, she made the nose more like Ingersoll’s than the original, I think. You’re going to be surprised at how gorgeous it is.
But Jack Ruple is the man that we have to thank.
And another one that I’m going to thank now is the man without whom we wouldn’t be standing here, whose courage, whose foresight, whose persistence made the acquisition of this place possible. A dedicated secularist, a freethinking, a devotee of secularism in all its best forms, Paul Kurtz. And I’m going to ask him to cut the ribbon and do the unveiling. Paul. Don’t worry, you won’t pull it off. It’s nine hundred and fifty-five pounds.
PAUL KURTZ: Okay, there we are.
ROGER GREELEY: Now I thought it might be appropriate if I shared with you Ingersoll’s actual words of dedication made January twenty-fifth, eighteen ninety-three. I don’t look much like him. I’m twelve years older than he was when he died. And I’ve still got some hair. But I’ll never have one-tenth of his genius. I want you to remember, before I recite his dedicatory remarks, that when he completed them there was a moment’s pause, and then he went into a three-hour lecture on William Shakespeare. The next night, on the Auditorium Theatre in Chicago he gave a three-hour lecture on Robert Burns. No notes. No teleprompter. Not even a glass of water. And Julia Marlowe, the famous Broadway actress, can remember going to his house for dinner, and after they all ate much too much, they adjourned to the living room, not just the men, but everyone, and the evening’s entertainment was Ingersoll reciting an entire play by Shakespeare. And when they came to the disputed passages, he showed which ones were actually written by Shakespeare and which ones were by interlopers and imposters. Small wonder we call this man the Mozart of oratory and a genius—but a very forgotten one. This crowd is an indication of the few, the proud, and the wonderful who still recognize what a contribution he made.
So in your mind’s eye go back to January twenty-fifth, eighteen ninety-three, a tiny town, a very cold night, snow on the ground, but you are sitting for the first night in the handsomest theatre in the world—some have said the finest theatre in the world of its size—and Ingersoll steps between the curtains and begins:
“Ladies and gentleman, nothing is nobler than to plant the flower of gratitude on the grave of a generous man, one who labored for the good of all, whose hands were open and whose heart was full. Praise for the noble dead is inspiration for the noble living. Loving words sew seeds of love in every gentle heart. Appreciation is the soil and climate of good and generous deeds.
“We are met here tonight not to pay but to acknowledge a debt of gratitude to one who lived and labored here, who was a friend of all, and who for many years was the provenance of the poor. To one who left to those who knew him best the memory of countless loving deeds, the richest legacy that man can leave to man. We are here to dedicate this theatre to the stainless memory of Philo D. Beckwith, one of the kings of men. This monument, this perfect theatre, this beautiful house of cheerfulness and joy, this home and child of all the arts, this temple where the architect, sculptor, and painter united to build and decorate a stage whereon the drama with a thousand tongues will tell the frailties and virtues of the human race, and music with her thrilling voice will touch the source of happy tears.
“This is a fitting monument to one who, broadening with the years, outgrew the cruel creeds, the heartless dogmas of his day, to one who passed from superstition to science, from religion to reason, from theology to humanity. To one who passed from the shadow of fear to the blessed light of love and courage, to one who believed in intellectual hospitality, the perfect freedom of the soul, and hated tyranny in every form with all his heart. To one whose head and hands were in partnership, constituting the firm of Intelligence and Industry, and whose heart divided the profits with his fellow man. To one who fought the battle of life alone, without the aid of place or wealth, and yet grew nobler and gentler with success. To one who tried to make a heaven here, to one who believed in the blessed gospel of cheerfulness and love, of happiness and hope. And it is fitting, too, that this monument should be adorned with the sublime faces wrought in stone of the immortal dead; of those who battle for the rights of man; of those who broke the fetters of the slave, of those who filled the minds of men with poetry, art, and light; of Voltaire, who abolished torture in France, and who did more for liberty than any of the other sons of man; of Thomas Paine, whose pen did as much as any sword to make the New World free; to Victor Hugo who wept for those who weep; of Emerson, a worshipper of the ideal, who filled the mind with suggestions of the perfect; of Goethe, the poet-philosopher; of Whitman: “Apple, why does the sky?” author of the tenderest, the most pathetic, the sublimest poem this continent has produced; of Shakespeare, the king of all; of Beethoven the divine, of Chopin and Verdi and of Wagner, grandest of them all, whose music satisfies the heart and brain and fills imagination sky; of George Elliott, who wove within her brain the purple robe her genius wears; of George Elliott, subtle and sincere, passionate and free. And with these the faces of those who on the stage have made the mimic world as real as life and death. Beneath the loftiest monuments lie ambitions worthless dust, while those who led the loftiest lives are sleeping now in unknown graves. It may be that the bravest of the brave who ever fell upon the field of ruthless war was left without a grave to mingle slowly with the land he saved. But here and now the man and monument agree, and blend like sounds that meet and melt in melody, a monument for the dead, a blessing for the living, a memory of tears, a prophecy of joy.
“Fortunate the people where this good man lived, for they are all his heirs, and fortunate for me that I have had the privilege of laying this little laurel leaf upon his unstained brow. And now, speaking for those he loved, for those who represent the honored dead, I dedicate this home of mirth and song, of poetry, art, and light to the memory of Philo D. Beckwith, a true philosopher, a real philanthropist.”
One more brief recitation, and then you’re free to look at everything and pick up a copy. Everything is free on this table for you. It comes with your conference.
This is my favorite quote, perhaps, and I know a few by Ingersoll, and this is my favorite, because to me it is most representative of what the man really believed, and it is as relevant today as it was in eighteen eighty-seven. When he was waiting for a train in Waco, Texas, and a reporter asked him, “Colonel, the clergy say that you are nothing but a secularist, one who goes around promoting secularism. How do you answer that charge?” And this, the excerpt I am going to give you, is a small portion of his whole reply, but this was a completely extemporaneous reply:
“Secularism? Secularism is the religion of humanity, for it embraces the affairs of this world. It is interested in everything that touches the welfare of a sentient being. It advises attention to the particular planet on which we happen to live. It means that each individual counts for something. It is a declaration of intellectual independence. It says that the pew is superior to the pulpit. It says that those who bear the burdens shall have the profits, and that they who fill the purses shall hold the strings. It is a protest against ecclesiastical tyranny, against being the serf, subject, or slave of any phantom, or the priest of any phantom. It proposes to let the gods take care of themselves. It is living for ourselves and each other, for the present instead of the past, for this world instead of another. It is striving to do away with violence and vice, ignorance, poverty, and disease. But it does not believe in praying and receiving, but in earning and deserving. It says to the whole world: Work that you may eat, drink, and be clothed! Work that you may enjoy! Work that you may give and never need! That is secularism. That is the religion of humanity.”
PAUL KURTZ: A brief conclusion. Roger, I think that we ought to debt of gratitude to you. There is what he looks like. Every year we brought him all over the country and brought him here to Dresden dressed up as Colonel Ingersoll. But he’s kept alive the “spirit” (may I say that—quotation marks?) of Ingersoll.
ONLOOKER: Do you believe in the spirit?
PAUL KURTZ: I believe in the creative aspect of human intelligence. But, you know, I think that this religion of secularism, that we really should rededicate it this time, our understanding of Ingersoll. We say that Ingersoll was the greatest orator of the nineteenth century? We’re too centuries beyond that. We’re in twenty-first century. He was an agnostic and a freethinker. But more than that, he was a secularist. And I think for the twenty-first century the great battle in the world is secularism—separation of church and state and the recognition that you can lead the good life here and now without need of an afterlife or supernatural or anything else.
Now there were great Titans in the nineteenth century that we know about and herald: Jefferson and Madison, Thomas Paine, and Abraham Lincoln. But I think in the second half of the nineteenth century surely it is Robert Ingersoll that stands out as the great exponent of secularism. And it seems to me in unveiling his statue today we should do honor to that, and I think in the museum, Thomas Flynn who has worked so hard in the past five years especially, ought to hear this, but I’m sure we ought to emphasize that point.
ROGER GREELEY: And they also should know that the fact that the color is so uniform, considering the age and the deterioration and the problems, that was all made possible by the man who is videotaping this proceeding, my dear dear friend of more than forty years, Floyd Smith.
PAUL KURTZ: One word. The Council for Secular Humanism purchased this building about 1986. It was going to be torn down and made into a parking lot. And so we saved the building. I shudder to think that you’re standing on these foundations and they’re holding everybody!
ROGER GREELEY: For a hundred thousand dollars it ought to hold a hundred thousand people!
PAUL KURTZ: Two hundred thousand dollars, when all is told. But what happened was, the house was in a state of absolute disrepair. And if we didn’t come in to rescue it—. But little did we know, we had a grant from New York State, and that quadrupled the costs because of all the rules and regulations that we had to follow. But in any case, I think the foundations are solid now. And I’ve been in Dresden so many times, but it’s a great thrill to see you. This stands out as the main commemoration to a leading secularist in the United States. And I think that’s important. His father was an itinerant minister. He came here in eighteen thirty-two. Only stayed a year. But Ingersoll was born in this house, in the room upstairs. And so we do herald that, and it’s very important. And we’re really glad that you’re here today and this weekend.
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