author
Ezra S. (Ezra Stiles) Gannett
1801–1871
A leading voice in 19th-century American Unitarianism, this Boston minister helped shape the movement’s early institutions while preaching for decades from one prominent pulpit. His life joined scholarship, reform-minded religion, and a dramatic final chapter that ended while he was traveling to preach.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1801, Ezra Stiles Gannett came from a deeply academic New England family: he was the grandson of Yale president Ezra Stiles, studied at Harvard College, and graduated from Harvard Divinity School. He entered the Unitarian ministry in the 1820s and became closely identified with Boston’s Federal Street Church, later Arlington Street Church, where he served for most of his career.
Gannett was more than a local pastor. Reliable historical sources describe him as a founder and the first secretary of the American Unitarian Association, and also as an editor and an important public figure within Unitarian life. Alongside preaching, he wrote and spoke widely, helping define the thoughtful, liberal religious culture that marked Boston Unitarianism in the mid-1800s.
He remained active in the ministry until his death in 1871. Accounts of his final days note that he was fatally injured in a railroad accident while on his way to preach, a striking end to a life spent in the service of church and public faith.