Addison Clark Gone Home
As these words are written, the heart of a great brotherhood, already stunned by the tiding of irreparable loss, is sadly awakening to the raization [sic] that the earthly labors of Addison Clark are ended. On Saturday* morning, May 11*, at twenty minutes past one o'clock, the great leader quietly passed away at the home of his daughter, Mrs. Lyman Russell, at Comanche, Texas. After the announcement some two months since of his serious and probably fatal illness, the public was not altogether unprepared for his death. He had, however, rallied sufficiently to be up about the house for a few days, and the family and intimate friends had begun to hope that he might even yet, with his iron constitution, conquer the disease which had fastened upon him. He himself was hopeful that an operation might resotre him to his usual health, as soon as he could gain the necessary strength to undergo it. About ten days before his death he again began to fail, and was soon confined to his bed. Though he had expressed himself earlier as being willing to go if "his work was done," he remained hopeful to the very last. He feared only that if he could not recover he might linger to need the care of others - so characteristic a feeling in one who never in his life had wanted anyone to be put to the least inconvenience on his account!
Friday afternoon he seemed to be in splendid spirits, and his faculties were never clearer. His daughter had been reading to him at intervals through the day articles from various magazines and journals. That afternoon he asked us to read a contribution to the current "Outlook" on "The New Bible," and discussed with keen and unflagging interest the great questions which were near to his heart. He seemed to be as one preparing by study and reflection for a great life work. His only reference to death was the direction given to his brother, Randolph Clark, as to funeral services in the event of the unexpected failure of the operation which he still believed could be performed within a few days. As his immediate attendants then left him for a little while he himself read with care and eagerness the daily paper which had just come. Life was never more full of meaning to him than at that moment.
About nightfall he was seized with a hemorrhage from the bowels and soon began to grow weaker. His physician administered an injection of morphine, and about 9 o'clock the self-forgetful patient turned to his family and said: "Don't sit up here with me. Lie down and rest, for you need it and I'm going to sleep." He soon had given himself to slumber - the last of earth. His waking was with his loved and lost "where they shall run and not grow weary, and shall walk and not faint."
Funeral services were held in the little chapel at Granbury on Sunday the 14th, at 10 a.m. It was Bro. Clark's request of many years standing that if he should be taken first, Bro. J.C. Mason should conduct the service, which he did in a spirit worthy of its great subject. Bro. H.M. Bandy, one of the early Add-Ran students and Bro. V.R. Stapp, pastor of the Granbury church, which had so long and faithfully loved Bro. Addison, assisted in the service. At 1 p.m. under the leafy bowers of the cemetery at Thorp Spring, while the tender songs of the Thorp Spring College choir fell upon the air, we sadly laid by the side of his beloved wife the honored form of Addison Clark, and turned away to face a world from which his leadership was gone.
Addison Clark was born near Dangerfield in Titus (now Morris) County, Texas, December 11, 1842. As a barefoot boy of twelve he made the good confession of Palestine, under the ministry of Carroll Kendrick. In 1857 the family removed to Midway, in Madison County, and in 1859 returned to North Texas. Here, near the old town of Farmington, in 1861, the young man enlisted in the Confederate army, in a company almost entirely made up of his comrades who belonged to the Christian church. This company saw service in the Trans-Mississippi department, under Gens. Walker and Kirby Smith.
During the war, his courage and marked ability were often in evidence. A second lieutenant, he was frequently called upon to act as first lieutenant, and was detailed by his commanding general himself to perform duties to which men of superior rank would have naturally been entitled. It was characteristic that when the quarter master guard which he commanded fell to the rear, he insisted on going to the front "with the boys," where service and danger were.
In 1866 he entered school at Kentuckytown, under "Uncle Charley" Carlton, removing with the institution to Bonham. After two years he became teacher as well as student. The unpretentious college was like a Greek academy so far as method and courses of study were concerned, and Addison Clark never stopped ___ the instruction that any or all of his teachers could impart. He pushed on into advanced Latin and higher mathematics, and threaded the devious ways of Hebrew by himself.
In 1869 he was married to Miss Sallie McQuigg, at Bonham. He had begun to preach about a year earlier, and, having an appointment on his wedding day, was married in the church and immediately went into the pulpit and preached as though nothing had happened.
During this year he removed to Fort Worth, where with his brother Randolph, he opened a private school near the stie of the present union depot. In 1873 Randolph Clark began a similar work in the old "Academy" building at Thorp Spring, in Hood County, and in 1874 wrote his brother in Fort Worth a letter styled "From Add-Ran College" - the first use of a name chosen in honor of his Brother Addison's first born, a son who died when three and one-half years old. In this year, 1874, Addison Clark himself removed to the new site and a charter was secured under the foregoing title, though Addison preferred the term "Academy" as not being so pretentious. "College" was chosen, however, so he determined to employ teachers of collegiate strength. To do this, it became necessary for the brothers to raise funds by selling lands for $4,000 that are today worth perhaps as many millions.
With the session of 1899-1900 he closed his services as president of Add-Ran. Under his administration the school had passed under church supervision, had been rechartered as "Add-Ran Christian University," and had won a reputation in both State and National circles of education.
His later career as pastor at Waco, and Amarillo, his two years' presidency of Add-Ran-Jarvis College at Thorp Spring, his ministry to the churches at Comanche, Stephenville and Granbury, can not be more than outlined here. His last pastorate was at Mineral Wells, where in anguish of body known to none but himself he resolutely continued his labor of love till the disease whose nature and power baffled the knowledge and skill of his physicians compelled him to listen to the importunities of his relatives and friends. With supreme resignation and sublime courage he began a battle for life in which death has seemed to conquer did we not know that "To live in hearts we leave behind, Is not to die."
* The day & date recorded in the article are incorrect. Randolph penciled in the correct date/day on his copy of the article = May 12, Friday
Source: The Christian Courier ... Volume XXIV … Dallas, Texas … Thursday, May 18, 1911 … Number 19
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20080809
Hico ~ by James Hopkins Wysong
Addison Clark
As a friend and college associate of the late Addison Clark, I beg the privilege of offering a tribute of respect to his memory through the columns of your paper.
He and the writer first met as students at the old Kentuckytown Academy of which "Uncle Charley Carlton" was then principal.
A warm personal friendship soon sprang up between us which grew into a yet riper friendship after our removing with the above institution to Bonham. Since our separation there our pathways have touched only at one point, in 1870, although for many years the fields of our respective labors were almost contiguous - a fact which enabled the writer to keep closely in touch with the labors and growing influence of this man of God. The occasion of eulogies has been splendidly occupied and so I ask your indulgence for throwing a simple willow wreath over the grave of one - loved in life and revered in death.
The genial kind-hearted, unpretentious friend, the sainless Christian gentleman, the splendid soldier of the 'lost cause,' will be with us no more, but we shall ever cherish a feeling of respect and admiration for this great leader and organizer of men - as we look through the record of the services rendered by him, of duties performed of sacrifices made of trials and sufferings heroically endured.
In all his life work, we can see exemplified in his character the rounded finish - the grace and symmetry of an almost perfect man.
Life's duty well and faithfully performed, our beloved friend has no more to do with these things of earth, an now sweetly sleep beneath the shade of the trees on the other side of the river.
Let the college associates of those far off days, wherever they may chance to be, pause for a moment, to recall the kindly deeds, the exemplary conduct and the splendid promise of our friend at the outer door of opportunity which we now realize to have been the presage of a more mature life of lofty Christian endeavor - a life humbly and worthy lived in our midst - a life devoted to the highest interests of humanity - a life so worthy of our fondest emulation.
"Sleep kindly on Thy noble life,
With cares and love replete
Has left on us its impress, rife,
With memories fond and sweet."
"Sleep on, dear friend. Such lives as thing
Have not been lived in vain
But shed an influence, rare, divine,
On lives that here remain."
Source: Hico, Texas, June 7, 1911 ... publication name & dateline not included with article
.
As a friend and college associate of the late Addison Clark, I beg the privilege of offering a tribute of respect to his memory through the columns of your paper.
He and the writer first met as students at the old Kentuckytown Academy of which "Uncle Charley Carlton" was then principal.
A warm personal friendship soon sprang up between us which grew into a yet riper friendship after our removing with the above institution to Bonham. Since our separation there our pathways have touched only at one point, in 1870, although for many years the fields of our respective labors were almost contiguous - a fact which enabled the writer to keep closely in touch with the labors and growing influence of this man of God. The occasion of eulogies has been splendidly occupied and so I ask your indulgence for throwing a simple willow wreath over the grave of one - loved in life and revered in death.
The genial kind-hearted, unpretentious friend, the sainless Christian gentleman, the splendid soldier of the 'lost cause,' will be with us no more, but we shall ever cherish a feeling of respect and admiration for this great leader and organizer of men - as we look through the record of the services rendered by him, of duties performed of sacrifices made of trials and sufferings heroically endured.
In all his life work, we can see exemplified in his character the rounded finish - the grace and symmetry of an almost perfect man.
Life's duty well and faithfully performed, our beloved friend has no more to do with these things of earth, an now sweetly sleep beneath the shade of the trees on the other side of the river.
Let the college associates of those far off days, wherever they may chance to be, pause for a moment, to recall the kindly deeds, the exemplary conduct and the splendid promise of our friend at the outer door of opportunity which we now realize to have been the presage of a more mature life of lofty Christian endeavor - a life humbly and worthy lived in our midst - a life devoted to the highest interests of humanity - a life so worthy of our fondest emulation.
"Sleep kindly on Thy noble life,
With cares and love replete
Has left on us its impress, rife,
With memories fond and sweet."
"Sleep on, dear friend. Such lives as thing
Have not been lived in vain
But shed an influence, rare, divine,
On lives that here remain."
Source: Hico, Texas, June 7, 1911 ... publication name & dateline not included with article
.
The Granbury Democrat
Addison Clark's work and influence was like the silent but incomputible [sic] forces of nature, great without ostentation. If modesty, and that self depreciation that is the extreme manifestation of it, were ever a fault in any one they were in him. He seemed never to suspect the greatness of personality in himself, that his friends and intimates plainly saw in him. When told of such estimates of him by those friends he looked incredulous and treated them as the exaggerated expressions of personal law and interest. In all the planning of his great life work, and in his public addresses which were many and important, self was never seen.
Source: The Granbury Democrat, 1911 ~ dateline not included with clipping
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Source: The Granbury Democrat, 1911 ~ dateline not included with clipping
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The Waco Times-Herald
Addison Clark has crossed over the river and rests under the shade of the trees. He was truly a great man - great in thought and particularly great in his service to humanity. He had felt the power of the Invisible and he met in joyous spirit every demand it made upon him. There was not protense [sic] about Addison Clark, and vanity he knew not. His one great ambition was to do his duty in that state of life to which it had pleased Got to call him, and he never faltered. When the storms beat fiercest, the spirit within was calm and sweet and resourceful, making it easy for him to succeed. Somehow, as we contemplate this man, heaven seems to be nearer and the things unseen become indeed the realities. The world is the gainer many fold by reason of the career of Addison Clark.
Source: The Waco Times-Herald, 1911 ... dateline not included with clipping
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Source: The Waco Times-Herald, 1911 ... dateline not included with clipping
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Crossing The Bar
Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there by no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea!
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell
When I embark!
But such a tide as moving seems asleep
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
For though from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face,
When I have crossed the bar.
Randolph appended a copy of this 1889 poem, Crossing The Bar, by Alfred Lord Tennyson ~ traditionally the last poem in Tennyson's anthologies ~ to the page that included tributes to Addison from The Waco Times-Herald, The Granbury Democrat and by James Hopkins Wysong.
Source: publication & dateline not included with clipping
.
And one clear call for me!
And may there by no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea!
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell
When I embark!
But such a tide as moving seems asleep
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
For though from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face,
When I have crossed the bar.
Randolph appended a copy of this 1889 poem, Crossing The Bar, by Alfred Lord Tennyson ~ traditionally the last poem in Tennyson's anthologies ~ to the page that included tributes to Addison from The Waco Times-Herald, The Granbury Democrat and by James Hopkins Wysong.
Source: publication & dateline not included with clipping
.
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