James DeKoven
Biography of a Famous Yet Forgotten Man
By John E. Magerus
Wipf & Stock, 288 pages, $32
James DeKoven (1831-79) was one of the most important presbyters of the Episcopal Church during the 19th century; he is remembered today, if at all, as a footnote to the ritualist controversy and the namesake of a retreat and conference center in Wisconsin. John E. Magerus, professor and administrator at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and, in retirement, archivist of the DeKoven Center in Racine, has set out to rescue DeKoven from this undeserved oblivion.
The story begins with DeKoven slipping on the ice and breaking his ankle, and the subsequent illness leading to his death less than seven weeks later. A 30-page history of the DeKoven family may be more than some readers want, but it provides an important context and gives “a fascinating story of upper-middle-class success in the antebellum and post-Civil War period of the United States.”
James DeKoven was born in Middletown, Connecticut, the ninth of ten children; he had many relatives and kept in close touch with them, learning of their important commercial and civic activities. His father was a sea captain and trader who spent his final years administering a considerable fortune; his mother came from an important local family from which her husband was also descended.
James had a much older brother who also became a priest and was the father of composer Reginald DeKoven. James studied at Columbia College (now, University) and the General Theological Seminary. He was a good student who received high honors despite frequent absences due to ill health. A chapter on his education gives a detailed account of life at General in the 1850s and its previous history.
After ordination in 1854, DeKoven went to Nashotah House in Wisconsin as tutor in church history and warden of the college department, which was merged with Racine College in 1859; he was given the title of rector and president (later, warden). He quickly made it into a Christian college, with daily chapel services and a faculty of Episcopalians. The model was that of a family, with all living, eating, and worshiping together; it was a model that had worked well at William Augustus Muhlenberg’s Flushing Institute and at William Sewell’s college at Radley in England. During his second decade at Racine College, he became more involved in national church affairs and was considered the leader of the ritualist party; his plea for tolerance at General Conventions is credited with preventing serious schism.
James DeKoven was an able teacher and administrator, an eloquent preacher and orator, and a man of great personal holiness. Many of his students became priests or important figures in civil society. He was nominated for bishop several times and elected by the clergy if not by the laity. Like John Keble in England, he had a national influence despite being far from the centers of power.
The only previous book-length biography was the portrait by an adoring former student, William Cox Pope, in 1899. Magerus has provided a more thorough and scholarly treatment that is both sympathetic and objective. The extensive bibliography attests to his diligence in tracking relevant sources. A foreword by Sheryl A. Kujawa-Holbrook gives a personal testimony to the value of church history from what is often the historian’s flyover zone.
Perhaps the most eloquent of the many tributes to DeKoven after his death was that of an anonymous “dear friend” in a letter to Church Eclectic: “There are some trees so great you cannot measure their size until they are down.”
The Rev. Lawrence N. Crumb is vicar of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Cottage Grove, Oregon, and has written book reviews for TLC since 1980.
