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BROUGHTON LOVED COFER
Famous Atlanta-London Preacher Pays Beautiful Tribute to the Late Lamented Leader of Methodism.
HE following letter from our Pul
pit Editor, Dr. Len G. Broughton,
together with the accompanying
letter from the honored Dr. M. J.
Cofer, shows the beautiful friend
ship that bound together these
great leaders of different denom
inations. We commend it to His
Unfortunate Majesty, Sir Critical
T
Unbeliever — it is enough to put him and his
kind evermore to a stammering hush:
CHRIST CHURCH
(Perpetuation of Surrey Chapel)
Pastors: Telephone:
Dr. LEN G. BROUGHTON HOP 52
Rev. ALBERT SWIFT
CHRIST CHURCH,
WESTMINSTER BRIDGE ROAD,
LONDON, S. E.
October 16th, 1912.
Mr. Will D. Upshaw,
Golden Age Publishing Co.,
Atlanta, Ga., U. S. A.
My Dear Will:
I am enclosing you herewith a letter which
has just come to me. For some unknown rea
son it was delayed, and reached me only to
day. It is, as you will see, a letter from Dr.
M. J. Cofer, one of the editors and the busi
ness manager of the “Wesleyan Christian Ad
vocate.” Only a few days ago I learned through
a letter from his sister, Mrs. Parker, of Athens,
Ga,, that he had died suddenly in his office, —
(Continued from Page 4.)
chain the hampered lightning within him and
in all the great papers where his genius shines,
let drive at every form of that crime-produc
ing, poverty-making drunkenness which is so
outrageously encouraged by the legalized sa
loon.
And William Randolph Hearst, who has stood
so long as the champion of the American work
ingman, ought to prove his practical friendship
for them, not merely by running bread wag
ons in Gotham to feed those whom the Trusts
and the Saloon have ruined, but by stopping
the publication of editorials which claim that
“drink does not produce poverty,” and further
more, by being brave enough to turn a con
tinuous broadside from his “great chain of
forts” into the legalized saloon —the worst
enemy of his treasured pal and protege, the
American workingman!
Our readers are witness to the
fact that we were fair to Mr. Will
iam Randolph Hearst when he pur
chased The Atlanta Georgian and
because, presumably, a builder in
our social, civic and commercial
life. We gave a full page in The
We Have
Been
Fair
to Mr.
Hearst.
Golden Age, entitled: “Seely Goes—Hearst
Comes —The Georgian Stays. ’ ’
We rejoiced in Mr. Hearst’s announcement
that there “would be no radical change in the
policy of The Georgian,’’ and we naturally con
strued that declaration to mean that The Geor
gian would continue to fight liquor, favor pro
hibition and stand vigorously for safe and sav
ing social and religious ideals. But the God
fearing men and women all over this section
who used to love The Georgian and bless its
entrance into their homes, are today heart
sick over the unwholesome change. And when
present subscriptions expire (we hear it on ey-
THE GEORGIAN RUNS AMUCK
The Golden Age, for November 21, 1912.
died in harness. I do not know that I have
been pained as much over the loss of any man
as I am over the loss of Dr. Cofer. For years
he has been one of my warmest friends. In
many of my ups and downs he has stood by
me as close as a brother. I love him with a
peculiar affection.
Our first meeting was at the home of our mu
tual friend, Sam P. Jones, and I remember
Sam Jones’ remark to me concerning him, pri
vately. He said, “Broughton, that man Cofer
in there you will find the longer you know him,
to be one of the truest characters that God ever
gave this world.”
I found it literally true. I sympathize a
great deal with Methodism in Georgia in the
loss of Dr. Cofer, I sympathize with the cause
o p civic righteousness, for he was ever faithful
in this respect. He was a man with a great
deal of common sense and always used it. But
more than this, he was a man of a great heart.
He sympathized with every interest that re
garded human need. He was a Methodist to
the manner born but he was interested in all
Christian work. There were two respects in
which he always stood by my side. First, in
connection with our Infirmary. While he was
directly connected with the Board of Gover
nors of the Wesley Hospital, he was never lack
ing in his interest in our Tabernacle Infirmary.
He was also a great friend of our Bible Con
ference, and always attended its sessions. He
was liberal in his gifts and never failed to help
me in the various enterprises that I tried to put
forth in Atlanta.
I am personally grieved, my heart is pained,
and I greatly sympathize with his family, and
ery side) The Georgian will “go” from this
type of homes at least.
Os course Mr. Hearst can stand it from a
money standpoint, hut the thing that puzzles
us is this —how can he prostitute such a meas
ureless opportunity to lift up the homes and
the youth of this country, and still keep his
conscience on top?
For instance —on the day following the re
cent Elks’ Ball in Atlanta, the front page of
The Georgian displayed great Shameful pic
tures of real men and women in each other’s
embrace “doing” certain new steps at the ball
—pictures that were “sensual and devilish” in
their influence upon the young boys and girls
who saw them.
Before God we believe that such pictures
ought to be kept out of our papers by law!
If Mr. Hearst wants to enjoy his “liberty of
conscience and freedom of soul” by using full
page editorials in his Saturday and Sunday edi
tions exploiting every ism and seism from Per
sia to Calcutta, and “blasting at the Rock of
Ages” with every form of religious folly that
can throw mud on the white garments of
orthodox Christianity—if Mr. Hearst wants to
do these things, we grant that he has the legal
right to “proceed to continue,” but he ought
to have more respect for our homes where the
Bible is loved and honored —yes, and for the
plastic, defenseless youth that shall be our
glory or our curse, than to let the “yellow” of
his journalism produce a moral jaundice that
never can be cured.
We had honored Mr. Hearst —we had de
fended him with tongue and pen against his
political enemies—we had believed in the reg
nancy of his conscience and the loftiness of his
purpose—and we had hoped, oh so fervently,
that his effort to keep inviolate his pledge to
the former friends of The Georgian, would
all his friends in their loss.
Fraternally yours,
LEN G. BROUGHTON.
Dr. Gofer’s Last Letter to Broughton.
Wraleyatt dfjrißtiati Abunralp
W. C. LOVETT, Editor
M. J. COFER
Asst. Editor and Bns. Manager
404-5-6 Wesley Memorial Church
, Atlanta, Georgia
September 19, 1912.
Rev. Len G. Broughton, D. D.,
London, England.
Dear Doctor Broughton:
Our Bible Conference Association is now in
corporated, the charter accepted and the of
ficers elected so far as is necessary until we get
your wishes as to committees, etc., Pres. Len
G. Broughton, Vice-Pres.; Richard 0. Flinn,
Sect.; H. A. Etheridge, Treas., J. J. Eagan.
You are dearly loved and greatly missed by
your friends here. We are looking with pleas
ure to your return next March. Nothing ex
traordinary is going on here, nothing that you
can not learn from the papers, which I assume
go to you from Georgia. Dr. Cobern has re
cently been here for a week at St. Paul Church.
His work was splendid. The Association will
be a unit for you to select the women and men
for the 1913 Conference. I keep up with you
in some measure through the press but this is
not like meeting you face to face.
Affectionately,
M. J. COFER.
DECLARES DRINK DOES
NOT CAUSE POVERTY
cause him to so fall in love with that pure
type of journalism that he would determine
to swing all of his great papers as mighty en
gines of power against bar-rooms and every
form of social and civic evil.
No other editor in America —in the world has
an opportunity equal to that of William Ran
dolph Hearst. God help him to awake and
prove that he loves homes and happiness for
the plain people of this country better than
he loves the “yellow glare” of that gold or
that journalism whose ideals “lead to bewilder
and dazzle to blind.”
GOOD, EASY
CHRISTMAS MONEY
You Want Some Christmas Money?
All Right—We Have It For You
Write The Golden Age, Atlanta, Ga.,
and learn about our liberal opportunity
for raising a Christmas Club with the big
gest commission we have ever offered.
The paper is to be enlarged and beauti
fied soon, and it will be easier than ever to
“talk it” and spread it everywhere.
Boy or girl, man or woman, write us
about that Christmas money!
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