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| Find A Grave photos by Doris Christensen |
There's no way of telling now, 113 years after the fact, what set off Russell's George W. Riker, prosperous farmer, entrepreneur, sometimes city council member, beekeeper --- and poet. But whatever it was caused him to launch a full-fledged assault --- in rhyme --- on preachers as Christmas, 1906, approached.
George's younger friend, Henry W. Gittinger, by now at age 45 at the editorial helm of The Chariton Leader, was only too happy to help him stir the pot, publishing Riker's "Pen Picture of Preachers" under the headline "The Poet Agnostic" on the front page of his edition of Dec. 13.
The two men had known each other for a long time. Henry, born during 1861 in Washington Township, Lucas County, was 10 years old when the Riker family --- George, Angeline and their three children --- arrived from upstate New York and launched a prosperous farming enterprise. Henry had begun his career in journalism in Russell, then relocated briefly to Pleasantville before settling down in Chariton.
George, born during 1837 in Cayuga County, far upstate in New York, was approaching 70 and a few years later would pen a brief autobiography for publication in Lucas County's 1913 history that describes his time in Lucas County as follows:
"In 1871 he (George) moved to Lucas county, this state, and settled on a farm in Washington Township, becoming in the course of years a representative and successful agriculturalist, with extensive interest in farming lands. He resided upon his property until 1882 and then purchased 11 acres, also in Washington Township but within the incorporation of the town of Russell and retired from active life. Since that time he has given a great deal of attention to the care of bees, finding both recreation and profit in bee culture. He has in addition perfected a number of inventions upon which he has taken out patents, among them a wire stretcher, a wire splicer and a culvert form, all of which have been tried and found practicable and useful."
The tombstones in the Russell Cemetery that mark the graves of George and Angeline suggest that they had been very prosperous indeed. Their Russell acreage constituted of the northwest corner of town, still largely undeveloped, north of the C.B.&Q. railroad tracks.
Here's how Henry presented George's poem in his edition of Dec. 13, 1906:
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The Leader herein calls attention to the various missionary societies of a fine field for operation right here in Lucas county. George Washington Riker, the poet agnostic of Russell, has broken loose again, and has this time crucified the clergy on a cross of poetry. Of course he offers it as a retaliation, for the preachers have been after Riker since the dawn of the Christian era. The following impious lines are printed in order that the vantage of attack may be studied and the author annihilated and removed from further affliction to the religious world. Advance copies of his great poem of darkness have been printed and forwarded to the press for criticism and establish the author's eternal guilt on two counts: On the unpardonable sin of writing poetry and second, from his attack on the clergy.
A PEN PICTURE OF PREACHERS
By George Riker
Preachers are found throughout our nation
Who think they know all about creation,
And, with some thought and preparation,
Tell us of hell and of damnation;
And they, through their imagination,
See more joy in anticipation,
Than there is in realization,
And tell the world, that's true salvation.
Preachers help make our population
Of every age and generation;
They travel on half transportation,
But seldom pay a just taxation.
Oft they must meet a new congregation
And are wise in its estimation;
But very soon their valuation
Is called for in a new location.
Preachers, like cranks in navigation,
Each have their turn in their rotation
With cranks of every other station
To keep this world in regulation.
The world can't help its hesitation
In believing much abomination
That preachers, through their education,
Have studied up for speculation.
Preachers perform much perpetration
When they themselves see ruination
In every form of degredation
Is grasping for their reputation.
Then they, with great humiliation,
In prayer of greater complication,
Go ask their God for restoration
In their people's high estimation.
Preachers of each denomination
Do sometimes meet in consultation
Where they devise some proclamation
Which they desire in operation.
Then each prepares a grand oration
Just fitting to the situation,
and sallies forth with agitation
That beats the world in affectation.
Preachers display their contemplation
With terrible determination,
And try to show by demonstration
Some proof of their faith expectation.
Their proof is like poor fabrication,
and to the mind almost stagnation:
For none attain high elevation
By following their faith dictation.
Preachers abhor a publication
Which any time makes intimation
That Christ was only man's relation,
From reasonable information;
And they extend an invitation
To every Christian organization
To spurn all such edification
And never make investigation.
Preachers of much sanctification,
Yet, far beneath transfiguration,
To suit their own gratification,
Or God's will, through his condemnation,
Cut them off from glorification.
Preachers talk about fornication,
And tell about Adulteration,
Their coolness and deliberations
Display most careful cultivation.
They seldom make a visitation,
Except to some rich man's plantation.
They see the poor die of starvation
And call that God's foreordination.
Preachers seem an abomination
To the growth of civilization,
Their hatred and tantalization
Drive many men to desperation.
Now, Bless my life, what consolation,
That I am free from priestcraftation!
Let earth with all its grand formation
Forever be my habitation.
Mr. Riker, long before he went into the poetry business, was janitor of the Presbyterian church, of his town, and his attendance at the services ought to have at least modified his sentiments, and aroused his genius in a better calling that than which he has fallen into. Besides, he served a term on the Russell town council and it is said that a milder mannered man never looked more wise in the House of Solons than he and never failed to fall upon his knees when the chaplain invoked a blessing on the deliberations, but he has undoubtedly gone wrong from some motive concealed with his breast, by this late affliction. In the closing stanza he expresses a desire to live on this wicked old earth forever. To our mind this is asking too much. A man of the rare genius which he displays ought to, at some time, be exported and tune his harp in a more congenial clime, and it is our opinion when the preachers read his masterpiece, they will be of the same opinion.
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Some years later, on the 27th of October, 1916, George was indeed "exported," dying at age 78 at the home in San Diego that he and his second wife, Ellen, had established a few years earlier, moving there to live near two of her sons from her first marriage. His remains were returned to Russell for burial beside his first wife, Angeline, who had died during 1901.
His old friend, Henry, had the final word on George in an obituary published in The Leader on Nov. 9, 1916:
"He had a fearless independence, almost amounting to audacity, and yet had a heart as kindly as that of the most sympathetic woman when it came to human distress and would go far to help relieve crying want.
"He enjoyed life, but in spite of his apparent rugged nature had an abiding charity which never failed when the test came. He despised the shams of life and was often misunderstood and censured by those who adhered more strictly to established customs, and yet who is there to say his unique methods were not equal in all humane respects. His life was clean, followed strictly moral habits, gave to a full measure of friendship."
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Henry, like George, was an aspiring poet --- and that most likely contributed to their friendship. As an editor, Gittinger quite often treated his subscribers to editorials in verse. His poetry, like Mr. Riker's, was interesting but awful. So they had that in common, too.
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