William R. Rathvon - Rathvon's Recorded Reminicences of Lincoln's Address

Rathvon's Recorded Reminicences of Lincoln's Address

As a public lecturer on Christian Science and one of the five top people in the church as a director, Rathvon would have had excellent access to the top quality recording devices of his time. In fact, Mr. Rathvon's reminiscences were recorded at the Boston studios of radio station WRUL on February 12, 1938; hence the quality of the 78rpm record.

The term "long lost," really doesn't apply, as the Rathvon audio recollections had been known by an extremely small circle of individuals ever since he made them in 1938. To Rathvon, they were actually incidental to what he felt were his more important church-work responsibilities. He made the recording for historical posterity. He, himself, never promoted them, or even promoted the idea that he had made them nor sold them. He seems to have wanted to preserve them for posterity and he died the following year, 1939. As tens of thousands of people heard the Gettysburg address and even as late as 1900, significant people in Lincoln's life, the Civil War Federal Army and even Lincoln's private secretary, John Hay, were still very active in government as Secretary of State under McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt, for most of Rathvon's life, there were literally thousands of witnesses to the event. Consequently, in the years leading up to the 1930s, it probably didn't occur to him to attempt to preserve his recollections for posterity. But with improvements in and access to the recording technology by the late 30s, and his advancing age, it was no surprise, that making a recording happened only a year before his death. Clearly, his position as one of five managers of his church kept him fully occupied right up to his death.