Robert Ingersoll lived in Peoria from 1857 to 1877. He was hailed as the greatest orator of his time, the latter half of the 19th century.
While Ingersoll attracted huge crowds, he had plenty of critics who called him “the Great Infidel” because of his criticism of organized religion. “Religion can make a good man somewhat better,” Ingersoll mused, “but usually it only makes bad men worse.”
While decrying the Bible and organized religion, Ingersoll supported women’s rights while opposing racism and the death penalty. “In an age before microphones and mass media, he was a household name in America—a thunderous voice for liberty, reason, and human dignity,” noted Tom Malone in his new book, The Portable Ingersoll.
Ingersoll had many names—the Great Agnostic, Royal Bob, the most noted of American infidels, and the daring blasphemer.
A successful lawyer, Ingersoll and brother Ebon established a law office in Peoria. After he and his family left central Illinois, Ingersoll lived in Washington, D.C., and New York City. Ingersoll was appointed Attorney General of Illinois before the Civil War where he served as a colonel in the 11th Illinois Cavalry. He was taken prisoner in the war by Nathan Bedford Forrest, the Confederate general who went on to found the Ku Klux Klan.
A lifelong Republican, Ingersoll gave the nominating speech for James Blaine at the 1876 Republican Convention. Although Blaine did not receive the nomination that year, Ingersoll’s speech was considered to be one of the great convention speeches of the 19th Century.
Ingersoll delivered another memorable speech that year in Peoria where he focused on the Declaration of Independence in a July Fourth celebration, noted Malone.
“Seven long years of war — fighting for what? For the principle that all men are created equal — a truth that nobody ever disputed except a scoundrel; nobody, nobody in the entire history of this world,” noted Ingersoll in the Peoria speech.
It’s believed that Ingersoll delivered around 1,500 lectures in 30 years, traveling the country while earning huge fees for his speeches, said Malone. “There’s a lot made of his focus on religion. That’s understandable but he was so much more than that. His speeches dealt with art and history, subjects like Shakespeare, Burns, and Thomas Paine. These were people he viewed as heroes,” he said.
Among Ingersoll’s admirers were some of the leading minds of the day, people like Frederick Douglass, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Walt Whitman, Andrew Carnegie, Mark Twain, and Thomas Edison.
If a producer is seeking a subject for a historical documentary, Robert Ingersoll might be just the ticket, said Malone. Such a program would not only shed light on an overlooked American but might salve our battered senses in these divisive times by promoting the importance of being happy.
An oft-repeated quote from Ingersoll: "Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so."
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