| Notes |
- from "Portrait and Biographical Album of Rock Island County, Illinois", pg. 377 1885
Rev. Charles Lincoln Morgan has been Pastor of the First Congregational Church of Moline since Nov. 1, 1881. He was born in East Boston, Mass., Jan. 31, 1849, the youngest of the three children of David and Marianne L. (Peirce) Morgan. The eldest, Mrs. Lucy M. Godley, died in Minneapolis Minn., in 1880. The second, David L. Morgan, is a prominent business man of Rutland, Vt. His father was a graduate of Dartmouth College in 1835, and was admitted to the Bar in Boston, where he practiced law till 1856. For two years, 1854-6, the family resided at Waltham, Mass. In May, 1856, when Charles L. was seven years of age, his father removed with his family to Minnesota and settled in Minneapolis, then a town of about 400 inhabitants. Here he practiced his profession and was prominent in all the political and educational interests of the place until his death in 1871. Charles L. left the High School at the age of 14 nearly prepared for college. In 1864 he united on profession with the Plymouth Congregational Church. The same year he entered the postoffice, of which his father was Postmaster during Lincoln's Administration, where he remained till the fall of 1865, when he became a clerk in the just opening dry-goods house of Wakefield & Plant. During the spring of 1867 a decision was reached to devote his life to the ministry, in accordance with which he left the dry-goods store and, hav-ing completed his preparations for college, entered Beloit College in Sept., 1867. Graduating from Beloit in 1871, he received the appointment as Principal of the public schools at Cheyenne, Wyo. Ter., for one year. He entered the Theological Department of Yale University in September, 1872, graduating from the same in May, 1875. Invited by the South Church of Springfield, Mass., to take charge of their mission work in connection with Hope Chapel for one year, he accepted and began his ministry there in June, 1875. During the fall and winter there ensued a growing spiritual interest, which resulted in the organization of Hope Congregational Church, with a membership of Sr, on March 15, 1876. Mr. Morgan was ordained to the ministry and to the pastorate of Hope Church on the same day and by the same Council. In November of 1880, a call to the pastorate of the First Presbyterian Church of Green Bay, Wis., was accepted. A year later a call was accepted to the First Congregational Church of Moline, 111., and removing thither the pastorate was begun which still continues. During the four years of this pastorate 113 have been received into the membership of the Church, 68 on confession of faith and 45 by letter. Repairs on the Church property have been made to the amount of $3,500. Two branch Sunday-schools have been conducted on the Bluff, for which a tasteful chapel is just completed at a cost of $3,000. Aside from his Church work in Moline Mr. Morgan has been a leader in the organization of the Society of Associated Charities, the Citizens' League for the Promomotion of Law and Order and the Young Men's Christian Association. In politics Mr. Morgan is first of all a Prohibitionist, believing that the destruction of the liquor traffic is the pre-eminent duty of this generation ; and second, a Republican in the belief that through the constituency of that party the end of prohibition can soonest be attained. On Sept. 14, 1876, Mr. Morgan was united in marriage with Miss Belle W. Merrill, born in Hinsdale, N. H., Oct. 31, 1849, the daughter of John B.and Caroline (Walker) Merrill, of Beloit, Wis. Two children have been born to them, - Carl Merrill, who died April 11, 1883, at the age of three years, and Gertrude Lincoln, born Feb. 19, 1844.
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1849 - 1936 (87 years)