What Do Thomas Alva Edison,
Rutherford B. Hayes and Oliver Hazard Perry
Have in Common?

he Bible tells us that all men are created in God’s image. As creator, God exercises care and superintendence over His creatures, a doctrine we call providence. Each of the men listed above played a pivotal role in our history, and we will study each in depth and on location next month on our Shores of Lake Erie Tour. Looking beyond the impressive résumés each left behind, we will examine each through the lens of Scripture to gain understanding where they fit and what role they played in God’s plan that shaped our nation and indeed our lives.

Learn more and register for the Shores of Lake Erie Tour!

Thomas Alva Edison

Edison uniquely combined both his bibliomania (he read every book in the school library and spent a lifetime devouring books) and his status as an autodidact (he was a self-taught genius who never settled for accepted scientific theories or traditional truisms). He pushed the boundaries of accepted ideas so much that “he only visited the box on occasion but lived outside it.” The fact that he was so hard of hearing that some thought him deaf enabled Edison to ignore small talk and polite conversation when he was pursuing some new idea. He got things wrong, made mistakes, but always always persevered. Although an agnostic in belief, the inventor is an example of the Common, perhaps an Uncommon, Grace of God which benefited mankind with 1,093 U.S. Patented inventions.

Oliver Hazard Perry

He went to sea as a 13-year-old midshipman in 1799 and by 1814 people were naming children after him and Congress awarded him medals and promotion for defeating the British Lake Erie fleet. Supremely self-confident and able to overcome every obstacle to success, he famously stated that “if a victory is to be gained, I will gain it.” Launching out from Put-in Bay, Perry brought to a war-weary people one of the few great American victories of the War of 1812. The monument to this hero dwarfs most others in the nation and is hard to get to. It is as unforgettable as Perry himself was to previous generations.

Rutherford B. Hayes

Ohio has often been called “The Mother of Presidents” and among the best of them is Rutherford B. Hayes. Elected in a monumental controversy and scandal over the election results from Florida in 1876, Hayes followed his victory with the termination of reconstruction in the south, civil service reform, and a reassertion of the power of the presidency. At the end of his life he said his service in the Civil War, where he was wounded five times as Colonel of the 23rd Ohio Infantry, was the greatest honor of his life, having also served as both Governor of Ohio and President of the United States. We will visit both the elegant home and the Presidential Museum of Rutherford Hayes in Norwalk and discuss the providential events in the life of the 19th President.

Learn more and register for the Shores of Lake Erie Tour!

In addition to the sites above, the tour includes a stop at Johnson’s Island Civil War Prison in Lake Erie, which was the scene of a few incredible prison breaks across the ice of the lake, as well as significant spiritual awakening among the men housed there. On Wednesday we will visit the Ohio Soldiers Home. Built in 1886, the Ohio Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Home admitted honorably discharged veterans from the Mexican Border War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the Persian Gulf War. We will tour their fine museum as well as enjoy a heart-warming dinner with veterans from across the wars.