CRAPSEY, Algernon Sidney 1847-1927

PERSONAL:

Born June 28, 1847, in Fairmount, OH; died December 31, 1927, in Rochester, NY; son of Jacob Tompkins (a lawyer) and Rachel (Morris) Crapsey; married Adelaide Trowbridge, June 2, 1875; children: nine, including Adelaide. Education: St. Stephens College, graduated, 1869; General Theological Seminary, New York, NY, graduated, 1872.

CAREER:

Worked as bookkeeper at a printing office in New York, NY, after 1865; ordained Episcopal priest, 1873; member of pastoral staff at an Episcopal church in New York, NY, c. 1873-1879; St. Andrew's Episcopal Church, Rochester, NY, rector, 1879-1906; convicted of heresy and deposed from ministry, 1906; public speaker and writer, 1906-27. International Peace Conference, delegate, 1907. State of New York, parole officer, 1914. Military service: Union Army, 79th Ohio Infantry, c. 1862.

WRITINGS:

Meditations on the Five Joyful Mysteries, 1888.

Sarah Thorne (memoir), 1900.

The Greater Love (novel), 1902.

Religion and Politics, T. Whittaker (New York, NY), 1905.

The Re-birth of Religion: Being an Account of the Passing of the Old and Coming of the New Dogmatic, John Lane (New York, NY), 1907.

(With Mangasar Mugurditch Mangasarian) The Mangasarian-Crapsey Debate: Resolved That the Jesus of the New Testament Is an Historical Personage, Independent Religious Society (Chicago, IL), 1908, published as Did Jesus Really Live?, Original Research Society (Chicago, IL), 1908.

The Rise of the Working-class, Century (New York, NY), 1914.

The Ways of the Gods, International Press (New York, NY), 1920.

The Last of the Heretics (autobiography), A. A. Knopf (New York, NY), 1924.

Shorter works include "Political Crimes and Their Consequences," c. 1901; "A Constitutional Defense of the Negro," Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church (Washington, DC), 1901; "International Republicanism: The Way to Permanent Peace," Society for Ethical Culture (Philadelphia, PA), 1918; "International Democratic Republicanism: The Only Way to Permanent Political Peace," Brotherhood (Rochester, NY), 1921; and "Lewis Henry Morgan: Scientist, Philosopher, Humanist," Rochester Historical Society (Rochester, NY), 1923.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Arguments for Presenters and Defense of Reverend A. S. Crapsey before the Court of Review of the P.E. Church upon His Appeal from the Judgment of the Court of the Diocese of Western New York, T. Whittaker (New York, NY), 1906.

Crapsey, Algernon Sidney, The Last of the Heretics, A. A. Knopf (New York, NY), 1924.

Religious Leaders of America, 2nd edition, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1999.

PERIODICALS

Churchman, January 14, 1928.*