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LOGAN, REV. THOMAS DALE - The need of the age is a spiritual awakening, bringing with it a deeper religion, patriotism, honor, and a love of truth. Material possessions are very well in their place, but they should not be permitted to usurp the more important things of life. Character, truth, honor, justice, love, faith - these are the things of real worth beside which the value of the world's wealth fades into insignificance. The need of the hour is to get things in right proportion again, to cease permitting the material to crowd out the spiritual, but ungrateful, indeed, is the work of those who are trying to bring about such a change. Thomas Dale Logan, who has been pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Springfield, Ill., for nearly a quarter of a century, is one who has labored long and faithfully in this great work. He was born January 29, 1851, in Pittsburg, Pa., a son of John T. and Henrietta L. (Bryan) Logan.

John Logan, the paternal grandfather of Dr. Logan, was born in County Armagh, Ireland, and died when John T. was but two years old. The paternal grandmother, Mary Kennedy, was the daughter of James and Jane (Maxwell) Kennedy, and a member of an influential family of Lancaster County, Pa. The maternal great-grandfather, George Bryan, was a member of the First Continental Congress in 1765, President of the Executive Council of Pennsylvania in 1778, Justice of its Supreme Court from 1780 to 1791, and the author of a law for the Abolition of Slavery in 1779. His son, also named George, was Secretary of State for Pennsylvania, and his wife, Maria Mayer Stienman, was descended from a prominent German Moravian family in Bavaria.

John T. Logan was born in Baltimore, Md., October 1, 1809, and in his youth learned the hardware business in Lancaster, Pa., whence he went to Pittsburg in 1829. He engaged in business there in 1831 under the firm name of Logan & Kennedy, and the firm still continues (in 1910) under the name of the Logan-Gregg Hardware Company. Mr. Logan was active in business and religious affairs in Pittsburg, and in that city his death occurred April 17, 1871. He was married March 17, 1842, to Henrietta L. Bryan, born at Harrisburg, Pa., July 5, 1814, and she died in Pittsburg, December 17, 1897.

The childhood of Thomas Dale Logan was passed at the family home in Allegheny (now a part of Pittsburg), Pa., and his preparatory schooling was secured in Newell Institute, a private school. He graduated from Lafayette College in 1869, at the age of eighteen years, and in 1874 graduated from the Western Theological Seminary. He taught school at the Newell Institute during 1872, and was licensed to preach the Gospel by the Presbytery of Allegheny of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A., in April, 1873. On leaving the theological seminary in April, 1874, he supplied the Second Presbyterian Church of Meadville, Pa., for six months, and was called to the presbytery of Erie, January 20, 1875. He was released from that pastorate in September, 1888, and on October 7, 1888, began his labor in the First Presbyterian Church of Springfield, where he was installed November 13, 1888. Dr. Logan was baptized and brought up in the faith of the Second Presbyterian Church of Pittsburg, and united with the Brainerd Presbyterian Church at Easton, Pa., in 1867, while attending college. He transferred his membership to the North Presbyterian Church of Allegheny until being ordained to the ministry. He was Clerk of the Presbytery of Springfield for thirteen years, Chairman of the Committee on Home Missions of the Presbyterian Synod for Illinois for twelve years, and a member of the General Assemblies of the Presbyterian Church of 1881, 1891, 1896, and 1908. He is a Republican in political views, but is bound by no party ties, being absolutely independent in his choice of a candidate. On graduating from LaFayette College, he received the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and three years later the degree of Master of Arts, and in 1894 he received from the same college the honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity.

On March 22, 1877, Dr. Logan was married at Meadville, Pa., to Caroline B. Mahoney, born at Meadville, a daughter of John and Elizabeth (Harrison) Mahoney. Four children have been born to this union: Howard, Elizabeth Harrison, Marjorie Sybilla and Elsie Caroline.