In his latter years this Unitarian minister—who was esteemed as both an author and reformer—was unanimously elected Chaplain of the United States Senate. Hale was personally acquainted with Dolly Madison, John Quincy Adams, Theodore Roosevelt, and William Howard Taft—not to mention Emerson, Lowell, Webster, Holmes, and Julia Ward Howe.

Hale’s uncle was the orator and statesman, Edward Everett. His father owned and edited Boston’s Daily Advertiser. Hale began his career as a legislative reporter, ultimately writing and editing 60 books. Most popular was his 1863 tale, A Man Without a Country, about a traitor who said in court that he wished he might never hear of the United States again. Accordingly, the man was banished to sea, forced to live aboard boats for more than 56 years.

Educated at Harvard, Edward Everett Hale began his Unitarian ministry by serving for ten years in Worcester, Massachusetts, and then, for 43 years, pastoring Boston’s South Congregational Church (Unitarian). He was keen to abolish slavery, advance tolerance, and reform public education, as well as to have the government regulate monopolies.

Asked when he was a U.S. Senate chaplain, “Do you pray for the Senators, Dr. Hale?” he replied, “No, I look at the Senators, and pray for the country.”