Charles Henry Parkhurst.
The Rev. Dr. Charles Henry Parkhurst was born in Framingham, Massachusetts, April 17, 1842. His father worked on a farm in summer and taught school in winter. Until sixteen years of age Charles was a pupil of the Clinton (Mass.) grammar school. The two years following he acted as clerk in a dry goods store. At the age of eighteen he began to prepare for college at Lancaster academy. At the end of the course there, he went to Amherst, from whence he graduated in 1866. The following year he became principal of the Amherst high school, remaining there until 1870, when he visited Germany. On his return he became professor of Greek and Latin in Williston seminary, holding that position for two years, during which period he married a Miss Bodman, a pupil of his while a teacher at Amherst. Accompanied by his wife, he next made a trip to Europe to study at Halle, Leipzig, and Bonn. Again in this country he received a call to the pastorate of the First Congregational church in Lenox, Massachusetts, where he soon gained a reputation as an original and forceful pulpit orator. On March 9, 1880, he became pastor of the Madison Square Presbyterian church, New York city, the call being the outcome of his work at Lenox. He immediately began to take a lively interest in city and national politics, and one of his sermons attracted the attention of Dr. Howard Crosby, president of the society for the prevention of crime, in which society Dr. Parkhurst was invited to become a director. A few months later Dr. Crosby died and Dr. Parkhurst was chosen as his successor. Dr. Parkhurst has done more for reform in New York city than any other single individual. His courageous course in connection with the Lexow investigation of certain phases of life in New York will not be readily forgotten.