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 PREFACE. rpHERE

is

not extant any one volume or set of volumes

that contains biographies of even one-half

who have

of the

United States. Hence, the purpose of Herringshaw's Library OF American Biography is to meet this glaring inadequacy, and to present in Five Compact Volumes the lives and achievements of thirty-five thousand of the most celebrated men and women who have been the founders, defenders and builders of this Great Republic of the United States of America, including every name of eminence it has produced from its formation to the present time. It is also illustrated with over Three Thousand Vignette Portrait Engravings. The most attractive form of history is Biography, which perpetuates the memory of individuals, and, while aptly illustrating the conduct of life, conveys important noted personages

lessons.

History,

it

eminence

risen to

in the

has been well said, does not

much

re-

gard fertile soil or material wealth but the admirable men they are the glory and women that a country produces of the country. In every city, town and village are men and women of character and influence, who have contributed by their enterprise and thrift, by their activity

—

and sagacity in business, their zeal in educational, in religious, and in political matters, to the moral and spiritual advancement as well as to the material prosperity of the

community in which they live. Herringshaw's Library of American Biography includes accurate biographies of

all the

Presidents and