ELIHU BURRITT

(1810-1879)

"THE LEARNED BLACKSMITH"

This man's career is the star example of the pursuit of knowledge under
difficulties. For years, while earning his living at the forge, he
denied himself all natural pleasures that he might devote every possible
minute to cramming his head with seemingly useless scraps of knowledge.

The acquisition of knowledge merely for its own sake is of course
foolishness, but it is a very rare kind of foolishness. Nearly always
the learned man pays his debt to society in full measure, if we but give
him time enough. So it was with "The Learned Blacksmith." From his deep
learning, Elihu Burritt at last drew the inspiration which made him a
powerful advocate in the cause of the world's peace.


From "Captains of Industry," by James Parton. Houghton, Mifflin & Co.,
1884.

Elihu Burritt, with whom we have all been familiar for many years as the
Learned Blacksmith, was born in 1810 at the beautiful town of New
Britain, in Connecticut, about ten miles from Hartford. He was the
youngest son in an old-fashioned family of ten children. His father
owned and cultivated a small farm, but spent the winters at the
shoemaker's bench, according to the rational custom of Connecticut in
that day. When Elihu was sixteen years of age his father died, and the