The Bishop's Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright

by Crouch, Tom D.

  Milton summarized three years of his son’s life in that brief paragraph, raising more questions than he answered. The accident at the Soldier’s Home was clearly a turning point for Wilbur. It brought an end to any serious talk of going to college, and marked the beginning of a period of withdrawal and depression. Friends and neighbors, even family members like Lorin, wondered at the sudden transformation of an active and athletic young man into a housebound “cook and chambermaid.”

  The details of the accident and its aftermath are so sparse that we cannot be certain when it occurred, or what the extent of Wilbur’s injuries actually were. Most biographers have dated the incident to March 1885. If so, then the bishop’s remark that Wilbur was in his nineteenth year at the time is incorrect. He did not turn eighteen until April 1885.

  Moreover, Dayton school records indicate that Wilbur was enrolled in the rhetoric course in March and completed the work with high marks that June, surely a difficult task for a student with injuries to the mouth and face. With this in mind, the winter of 1885–86 seems a more likely period for the accident to have occurred.

  Milton stated that the initial injury was minor, but he did not see his son for some weeks after the accident. It is clear that the accident itself was less worrisome than the heart palpitations and digestive complications that developed in its wake. It was the first step in a chain of events all too familiar to many nineteenth-century American families. A sudden accident, an apparently simple illness, followed by the appearance of far more serious complications leading to lifelong debility.

  Milton Wright had seen it happen in his own family. Many years before, William, his most promising brother, had lost his “wit in conversation and public speaking” following what seemed to be nothing more than a minor attack of “dyspepsia.” Milton blamed such problems on damage to the nervous system, which was particularly susceptible to shock and injury during periods of severe illness, stress, or physical trauma. The body was then open to attack and permanent damage might be done to the heart, stomach, brain, or other vital organs.

  The family insisted on a period of extended rest for Wilbur when the first sign of serious complications developed. They could begin to relax by the end of the year—the immediate crisis had passed. Among the many things for which Milton offered thanks in his diary on December 31, 1886, was the fact that “Wilbur’s health was restored.”

  But the accident, complications, and the long recuperation left an indelible mark on the young man. In his own mind, he was now a “potential invalid,” convinced that his once robust constitution was so fragile that any thought of returning to his former active life was out of the question. Wilbur had always assumed that he would attend college. “Intellectual effort is a pleasure to me,” he told his father.

  I have always thought that I would like to be a teacher. Although there is no hope of attaining such financial success as might be attained in some of the other professions or in commercial pursuits, yet it is an honorable pursuit, the pay is sufficient to enable me to live comfortably and happily, and teaching is less subject to uncertainties than almost any other occupation. It would be congenial to my tastes, and I think with proper training I could be reasonably successful.19

  But that dream was now beyond his grasp. A permanent teaching post would require a college diploma which, in view of his uncertain health, “might be time and money wasted.”

  Unable to chart a new course that appealed to him, Wilbur fell into a depression born of frustration, indecision, and self-doubt. Friends left home, launched their careers, and established families of their own while he remained at home, prey to feelings of vulnerability and a growing sense that he might be unequal to coping with an ordinary, independent life. Always deeply introspective, he began to withdraw into himself.

  In 1902, when an acquaintance, George Spratt, voiced similar doubts about his own ability and capacity, Wilbur responded with some sage advice:

  I see from your remark about the “blues” that you still retain the habit of letting the opinions and doings of others influence you too much…. It is well for a man to be able to see the merits of others and the weaknesses of himself, but if carried too far it is as bad, or even worse, than seeing only his own merits and others’ weaknesses … there was no occasion for your “blueness” except in your own imagination. Such is usually the case.20

  When Spratt refused to snap out of his depression, Wilbur renewed the attack: “I am sorry to find you back at your old habit of introspection, leading to a fit of the blues. Quit it! It does you no good, and it does do harm.”21 Wilbur understood what damage a severe case of the “blues” could do, and advised Spratt to pull himself out of his depression by sheer force of will and strength of character. That was what he had done, though it had taken some time to accomplish.

  Unable to formulate new goals and unwilling to continue brooding, Wilbur simply chose to ignore his own problems and devote himself to nursing his mother. Susan Wright now required constant care. Her tuberculosis, which had first appeared in 1883, was already much worse. By 1886 she had become a helpless invalid.

  For Milton, the loving husband and dedicated churchman, the illness created an impossible dilemma. In order to remain at home and care for his wife he would have to resign his duties as bishop of the West Coast and abandon the fight against the Liberals. The older boys could be no help—Reuchlin was overwhelmed with family problems of his own, while Lorin was off in Kansas seeking his fortune. The younger children, Orville and Katharine, aged fifteen and twelve, required taking care of themselves.

  Wilbur, whose own plans had been forestalled by ill health, was happy to step into the breach. He did not feel that he was being particularly self-sacrificing. It was a son’s duty to care for his parents. In addition, a period of rest and quiet at home would benefit his health, and give him an opportunity to pursue his own interests. Most of the world would come to regard the invention of the airplane as Wilbur’s finest moment. Milton thought otherwise:

  His mother being a declining, rather than a suffering invalid, he devoted himself to taking all care of her, and watching and serving her with a faithfulness and tenderness that cannot but shed happiness on him in life, and comfort him in his last moments. Such devotion of a son has rarely been equaled, and the mother and son were fully able to appreciate each other. Her life was probably lengthened, at least two years, by his skill and assiduity.22

  Milton’s large and varied library became Wilbur’s preserve during the years 1886–89. “He … used his spare time to read and study, and his knowledge of ancient and modern history, of current events and literature, of ethics and science was only limited by the capacity of his mind and his extraordinary memory.”

  The Encyclopaedia Britannica and Chamber’s Cyclopedia were at his fingertips, as were those classics of history and biography which the bishop cherished—Plutarch’s Lives, Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Guizot on the history of France, Greene on the history of England, and Boswell’s Life of Samuel Johnson. There were sets of Hawthorne and Sir Walter Scott, and popular science alongside theological works. Milton, never a man of narrow religious temperament, had even purchased the works of the “demon atheist,” Robert Ingersoll.

  Wilbur was clearly emerging from his shell by the spring of 1888, three years after the accident. The time had been well spent. He knew that he was now as well read as any college graduate, and that he had the makings of a clear and confident writer and speaker. The long hours spent nursing his mother had made him feel needed and useful once again. Moreover, he had enlisted in the United Brethren fight as his father’s strong right arm in Dayton.

  That spring, Wilbur published a short tract entitled Scenes in the Church Commission During the Last Day of Its Session. His first piece of published writing, it was a lucid, concise, and professionally strident bit of Radical propaganda. He had gathered the material for the pamphlet three years before, in the fall of 1885, when the Church Commission established
by the General Conference of 1884 met in Dayton. Milton, like all of the bishops, had been named to the commission. True to form, he refused to attend what he regarded as an illegal and unconstitutional body. He left for the West Coast as usual late that summer and was in Oregon when the first session was called to order on November 16, 1885.

  The Religious Telescope announced that the commission would conduct its business in closed-door sessions. Wilbur, following the proceedings with obvious interest, was not surprised. “It seemed entirely proper, and indeed fitting,” he wrote, “that a body meeting to legislate secrecy in, should also legislate in secret.”23

  In fact, visitors were to be admitted, although the commission had chosen not to advertise the fact. Wilbur did not attend until the final session on November 23, when he heard a debate that raged through the afternoon. A great many Liberals were as philosophically opposed to secret societies as Milton Wright, but feared that the absolute prohibition of these organizations was driving members out of the church. They sought to abolish penalties for membership in a lodge, but to include a statement in the new Constitution suggesting that Christians “ought not” to belong.

  Others took a harder line. The president of the commission went so far as to argue that the position on secretism, like the classic abolitionist stand of the church before the Civil War, placed the Brethren in an untenable political position. “We made a great mistake on the slavery question,” he maintained. “Our opposition was not judicious. Other churches, by taking a milder course, were enabled to do a great work in the South, while our church was not able to do anything.”24 Wilbur—Milton Wright’s son, Dan Wright’s grandson—was appalled.

  Before the close of the session, the commission managed to produce a draft of a new Constitution and Confession of Faith to be put to a vote by all church members in an election which the commission would oversee. Wilbur, who had made very careful notes on the alterations to the traditional documents approved at this session, was outraged to discover that the official versions of the new Constitution and Confession published in The Religious Telescope in January 1887 did not match those approved by the commission. Apparently the Liberal leadership had illicitly introduced further alterations.

  Most of the members of the Constitutional Association, led by Milton Wright and his friend and ally Halleck Floyd, argued for a complete boycott of the election. Such decisions were the work of the General Conference, not a special commission; the vote was illegal and divisive. Over the next year and a half the Radicals increased their already heavy travel schedules to include attendance at local conferences in order to argue against the election.

  Wilbur joined the fray in the spring of 1888, transforming the rough notes taken three years before into the most effective Radical pamphlet of the entire campaign. Scenes in the Church Commission was first sold through the Conservator, then given away by the thousands at local conferences and to church congregations.

  The general election was held later that year. The Liberal commissioners charged with responsibility for the voting had stacked the deck in their favor, distributing ballots with a large “X” already printed in place to indicate the Liberal position. To vote for change, a member had only to return his ballot unmarked. In order to vote the Radical position, the printed response had to be erased and the new vote written in.

  The Radicals had expected something like this, and called for a boycott of the election. The rules stated that a two-thirds majority was required for the passage of any suggested change. Milton reasoned that if only one third of the church members could be persuaded not to vote, the conservatives would win by default. The Liberals, on the other hand, argued that they could win with a two-thirds majority of those voting.

  Both sides assumed that they had won. The Liberals obtained their two-thirds majority on each of the four issues: the new Confession of Faith; the new Constitution; the admission of lay delegates to the General Conference; and the specific question of secret societies.

  The Radical boycott had succeeded as well. A total of 54,250 church members cast the preprinted ballots; the total membership of the church in 1888 was 204,517. Three quarters of the members had not voted. Obviously the Liberals would appear at the General Conference to argue for the validity of the election, while the diehard Radicals would argue against it on the basis of their reading of the two-thirds rule.25

  Recognizing that a final confrontation at the conference might shatter the church, most members of the old Radical faction were ready to capitulate and join hands with the victorious Liberals. Bishop Wright would have none of that. He continued to work at a frenzied pace, and Wilbur relished the opportunity to enter the fight on his father’s behalf, distributing thousands of copies of Scenes in the Church Commission and other conservative pamphlets.

  “The tract is producing a big stir,” he told Milton. “The Liberals can’t hold still, and every movement they make only draws out some new admission.” Three thousand of the little booklets were mailed that summer, with an additional 1,100 copies ready for distribution at the General Conference. “When we begin to circulate them free,” he noted with some relish, “there will be fun.”26

  Wilbur continued to write articles and editorials of his own responding to attacks on his father. There were those, like the Reverend W. J. McGee, who wondered at the presumption of this young man who dared to argue important issues with elder churchmen. Wilbur was more than able to to defend himself—and get in a few licks of his own at the same time.

  Your complaint that I am only a boy sounds rather strange coming from the lips of a Liberal. They have been complaining for years that the Radicals were “old fogies,” “antediluvians,” etc., and rejoiced that they would soon die off. Now to suit the exigencies of the times you complain that they are too young! You seem to infer that I am too young to tell the truth. Is there any precise age at which men become able to speak the truth? I know children not five years old who tell the truth. It has not been the custom, therefore, to grade the truth of statements by the age of the person giving voice to them.27

  The tone of feisty self-confidence indicates the extent to which Wilbur had left depression behind. At an age when most young men were breaking their family ties, he had enjoyed his first success and achieved some measure of visibility, not by striking out on his own but by writing in support of his father’s cause.

  All of the Wright family crises came to a head during the spring and summer of 1889. Milton had worked feverishly since the general election, traveling from congregation to congregation gathering signatures on petitions he would carry to the General Conference of 1889. It was the one time in his life when work came before family.

  Susan was sinking rapidly. Back in August of 1888, just after Milton had left home on his annual West Coast trip, Wilbur wrote: “Mother thinks that while it is not absolutely necessary on account of her health that you should return before your time is up, yet she would feel more comfortable if you were here.”28 Milton was still in Indiana when he received the letter, about to catch a train for Oregon. It must have been a difficult moment for him. His presence would be a great comfort to Susan, who had spent so many years of her life waiting for him to return home. Still, there was the Lord’s business to be done. He compromised, continuing on his journey, but returning to Dayton several weeks earlier than usual.

  The leaders of the United Brethren Church gathered for the General Conference at York, Pennsylvania, on May 9, 1889. Each man knew that the time for parliamentary maneuvering or compromise had passed. The conference opened, as usual, with a joint message from the bishops. The address called attention to the work of the Church Commission over the past four years, and noted that the vote of 1888 establishing a new Constitution and Confession had been legal and binding upon the conference. Five of the six bishops signed the message. Milton was the lone dissenter.

  The final vote to accept or reject the work of the commission, and the new Constitution and Creed, came at 4:00 P.M. on Saturd
ay, May 11. The result was overwhelming—III for adoption, 20 against. Still hoping to avoid a catastrophic split, J. W. Hott spoke for moderate Liberals, expressing “our deep regret that any of our brethren should not be able to cheerfully acquiesce in the decision of the great majority of the votes of our people,” and honoring the Radicals for “their faithfulness to their beliefs.”29

  Good wishes were not enough for the diehard remnant of the Radical party. On the morning of Monday, May 13, Bishop Kephart read a proclamation signed by all the bishops except Milton Wright, declaring that the new Constitution and Confession of Faith were now in effect. Milton and fourteen of the twenty delegates who had voted against the commission were no longer present. They had rented the Park Opera House in York, and now proceeded to conduct business as the “lawful” General Conference under the provisions of the old Constitution.

  The Radicals remained in session until May 20, completing arrangements for the organization of what would be known as the Church of the United Brethren in Christ (Old Constitution). Milton, the only bishop to withdraw, was unanimously reelected by the conservative conference on May 16. Horace T. Barnaby, Halleck Floyd, and Henry J. Becker completed the roster of bishops.30

  Bishop Wright was the undisputed head of the Old Constitution church. As one of his colleagues remarked, “if Philip William Otterbein can be truthfully called the founder of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, Milton Wright, with equal truth, can be called the preserver of that Church.” Bishop Milton Wright “stood like a hero,” noted the Christian Conservator, now the official organ of the Old Constitution church. “When all the other bishops faltered and fell prostrate before the commission compromise with the world, he stood faithful among the faithless, and deserves great credit from every United Brethren.”31