Sándor Bölöni Farkas

Sándor Bölöni Farkas or Alexander Farkas (Bölön, January 15, 1795 – February 4, 1842) was a writer who is perhaps best known for his journals (Journey in North America) he made while traveling the United States in 1831. He described the United States as a wonderland, and praised American democracy very highly. The book was banned by the Roman Catholic Church in 1834.

Farkas was a Hungarian Szekler Unitarian who was instrumental in making a connection between American and British Unitarians and the surviving Unitarian Church in Transylvania.^[1] He was the first Hungarian Unitarian to visit America, as the secretary to Count Francis Beldi on a trip to Paris and America. In three months—September 3 to November 23, 1831—Farkas and Count Beldi toured New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. His Account of the Unitarians of Transylvania, was communicated in Latin to the Secretary of the British and Foreign Unitarian Association and published in The Unitarian advocate and religious miscellany in 1832.

Works

(Hungarian) Journal of a visit to America, Kolosvar 1834

There are two English translations of his Journey:

Bölöni Farkas, Sándor. Journey in North America. Translated and edited by Theodore and Helen Benedek Schoenman. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1977. ISBN 087169-120-5
Bölöni Farkas, Sándor. Journey in North America, 1831. Translated and edited by Arpad Kadarkay. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-Clio, c1978. ISBN 087436-270-9

The Journey is available online in the original Hungarian:

References

^ Notes and Documents the Visit of Alexander Farkas of Bolon to Pennsylvania in 1831 Pennsylvania history Vol 34-35 1967 Pennsylvania Historical Association - 1967

Persondata
Name	Farkas, Sandor Boloni
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	January 15, 1795
Place of birth
Date of death	February 4, 1842
Place of death