News, Hymn History, & Resources

  Many of our hymns and gospel songs are born out of adversity and tragedy. Such is the case with “Precious Lord, Take My Hand.” Thomas A. Dorsey g...

Annie Sherwood Hawks, authoress of “I Need Thee Every Hour” and numerous other popular hymns, was born May 28th, 1835, in Hoosick, New York. Thoug...

Robert Lowry was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on March 12, 1826. He was converted at the age of seventeen, and from that moment began labori...

Henry Francis Lyte was born June 1st, 1793 in Scotland. A graduate of Trinity College in Dublin, Lyte was a multitalented man. He was scholar, poe...

Elias Keach, born 1667, was the only son of Benjamin Keach, imminent Baptist preacher, and hymn-writer of England. Elias traveled to Philadelphia in 1686 when he was nineteen years old. He was at this time an ungodly young man and, for sport, deceived those he met by portraying himself as a minister of the gospel. Almost immediately, he was asked to preach, and when mostly through his sermon, stopped suddenly.

     Benjamin Beddome was born at Henley, Chatwickshire, on January 23rd, 1717. In 1724 when Beddome was quite young, his father became co-pastor o...

Frederic Denison was born in Stonington, Connecticut, on September 28th, 1819. Educated at Bacon Academy in Colchester and later the Connecticut L...

Daniel Webster Whittle was born on November 22^nd, 1840, in Chicopee Falls, MA. He was named for the statesman his father greatly admired – Daniel Webster. Before the Civil War, he and his three brothers moved west to Chicago, where Whittle worked as a cashier at the Wells Fargo Bank. It was here that he committed his life to Christ. One night he was the night watchman. At midnight he says:

This week's Melody Moment is a continuation of last week's post. Click here to read if you missed it!The Repair A faithful student of the Word, Ba...

     Benjamin Keach was born in Stokehaman, England, February 29^th, 1640. He called upon Christ Jesus for salvation when he was fifteen and followed the Lord in believer’s baptism.

Samuel Francis Smith, D.D. was born in Boston, MA, in 1808. He was educated at Harvard University and was a classmate of Oliver Wendell Holmes. Af...

Eliza Jane Edmunds Hewitt was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on June 28th, 1851. She graduated high school as valedictorian and became a teac...