In April, 1936, he wrote an Easter hymn
10. Oh, who shall roll the stone away?
which first appeared in the Boston Transcript. It is included in The Hymnal, 1940.
In his later years he published, or had privately printed, several small booklets containing these and other poems by him: Songs of the Spirit, 1932; Songs of Faith and Hope, 1940; Songs at Sunset, 1951; Songs of a Lifetime, 1953; and In a Rose Garden, 1956. Of these, Songs of a Lifetime contains what he regarded as his best poems, as well as his latest hymns, among them one widely used on United Nations Sunday, beginning,
11. Freedom, thy holy light,
and a fine national hymn,
12. O my country, land of promise,
A number of his hymns have been included in the hymnals of several denominations, and No. 2 was translated into Japanese.
Dr. Ham’s hymns manifest a deep spiritual insight expressed with literary craftsmanship of a high order, which make them among the most notable contributions to American hymnody in the first half of the 20th century.
H.W.F.