Talk:Robert G. Ingersoll
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Below text moved from "Robert Green Ingersoll", since made into redirect to here. Any new info below should be incorporated into the existing article. -- Infrogmation 05:05, 30 May 2004 (UTC)
Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899), “the Great Agnostic,” was best known for both his supreme oration skills and his skepticism of religion and gods. A lawyer by trade, Ingersoll gained his fame touring America giving lectures that were, by all accounts, masterful in both content and delivery.
Ingersoll was born in Dresden, New York on 11 August, 1833. His father, John, was an itinerant Presbyterian Minister, and Ingersoll was raised with his father’s firey Presbyterian views. Later in life Ingersoll would recall his religious upbringing less than fondly. During these years Ingersoll received little formal schooling. He did much learning on his own, and later apprenticed himself to two Peroia, Illinois lawyers so that he could practice law.
Ingersoll spent a brief period in the Union Army during the early days of the American Civil War, as a Colonel. He was captured by the Confederacy and then released upon the condition that he not return to military service. Ingersoll complied, returning instead to a small but thriving legal practice he had founded with his brother, Ebon Clark, in Peoria.
Ingersoll’s reputation as a public speaker grew after his return to Peoria. He flirted briefly with a career in politics, holding a single political post as Attorney General of Illinois. His radical views on religion, slavery, woman’s suffrage, and other issues of the day, however, effectively prevented him from ever pursuing or holding higher offices. Instead he became a public speaker, using his skills with oration to earn a reputation and a fortune.
Many of Ingersoll’s speeches advocated for freethought and humanism, and often poked fun at religious belief. For this the press often attacked him, but neither his views nor the negative press could stop his rising popularity. At the height of Ingersoll’s fame, audiences would pay $1 or more to hear him speak—a giant sum for his day.
Ingersoll died of heart failure at age 65. Soon after his death, Clinton P. Farrell, a brother-in-law, collected copies of Ingersoll’s speeches for publication. The 12-volume “Dresden Editions” kept interest in Ingersoll’s ideas alive and preserved his speeches for future generations.
[edit] Wikiquote tag
I don't know my way around Wikiquote well enough to track down the quotations on this page and get them properly transferred, but the quotation-to-article coefficient seems untenably high.
Thanks, Johndodd 04:46, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
