Hon. F. X. Schoonmaker

              190?

Figure

HON. F. X. SCHOONMAKER.
THE MUTUAL LYCEUM BUREAU,
FRANK A. MORGAN, MANAGER,
55 AUDITORIUM BLDG,
CHICAGO, ILL.



F. X. Schoonmaker's
LECTURESON
China: The Shadow on the World
The most Interesting, Fascinating, Eloquent Lectures ever delivered under our auspices,—Thomas Lyceum Bureau, San Francisco.

THE THIRD EXODUS OF THE CHINESE: Forced by want to modernize and manufacture, the Homeogeneous half of the human race about to compete with the Heterogeneous half for the markets of the world.

THE ARTS, THE LITERATURE AND THE MORALITY OF CHINA: Silk, Tea, Pottery, Porcelain, Cloisonné, Jade.  The fabrication of the Peachblow Vase.  The marvelous story of The Mirror.  The two languages, one of which no woman has ever learned.

CHRIST AND CONFUCIUS: The similarities and the differences in their teachings.  Why they survive.  Which will survive.

CHINESE CIVILIZATION: Evolved in isolation, it differs from all other civilizations.

THE CHINAMAN: The kind of man produced by Chinese civilization.  His potentiality.

CHINA: Its age, past and present conditions.

Why China will be Christian: Why it is not so now.  Why the Christianizing of China is inevitable.

Other lectures, among them:
Wu Ting Fang: Li Hung Chang—Representative Chinamen; America in the Pacific; The United States as a World Power; American Destiny.



EX. SCHOONMAKER: Born in Masillon, O., January 10, 1850.  Parents: John Dupuy Schoonmaker, of Ulster, N. Y., and Alice Gillespie, of Freeport, Pa. Married, 1874, Melissa M. Burtt, daughter Prof.  Andrew Burtt, Author Burtt's Grammars, Principal Ralston School, Pittsburg.  Residence: Chicago.  Educated for missionary work.  Finished collegiate studies June, 1867, year before graduating age, at Loretto, Pa. Valedictorian for graduating class.  Spent following year in special studies.  Graduated 1868, again delivering Valedictory.  Studied law, journalism and politics, 1869 until 1876.  1876 until 1881 on staff New York Times.  Furnished Times, among other exclusive news articles, Princess Suvaroff Interview, story of Theft of Stewart's body from St. Mark's churchyard, and Exclusion of Jews from Grand Union Hotel, Saratoga, by Stewart Estate—latter pronounced greatest beat in American journalism.  Became manager National Associated Press, 1881.  Reorganized that into United Press Association, 1882.  Elected its General Manager.  In that office originated and developed present American system of collecting, editing and distributing foreign, or cable, news; and devised and instituted the wire system by which American daily papers receive their news over their own lines, under their own control, by their own operators.  Effected arrangement through which Associated Press shared original news service and wire service of United Press, resulting in merging the two Associations and permanent founding on its modern lines of present Associated Press.  In 1887 resigned office General Manager United Press to devote whole time to foreign news service of United Press, Associated Press and a number of newspaper syndicates—work that had engaged his attention since 1881.  Continued General Foreign News Editor until 1896.  Entire period profoundly interested in China, its history, literature, art, civilization and future, and during researches assembled collection of Chinese porcelains, cloisonné and jade.  Between 1876 and 1896 delivered several hundred lectures, on economic subjects and oriental problems, in response to demands for the accurate and original information his position and travel gave him and his skill in oral statement.  1899 invited by California State Board of Trade to go to Pacific coast and lecture to the people there—among whom scores of thousands of Chinamen had dwelt for forty years—on China, the Chinese, Philippine Expansion, Western Development, and Oriental Trade; selected as the best fitted living man for the task, the topics chosen as the most pressing and important subjects for American thought.  Prepared his seven great lectures on The Shadow on the World, for this tour.  The arrangement contemplated 60 lectures.  600 were delivered: the tour was extended from 4 months to 32, and from California over Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Wyoming.  Every delivery, but one, of single lectures brought calls for the others: of the course, for repetitions.  Familiarized, by the requirements of the positions he has occupied, with the little information in our literature respecting China and the vast amount left out, Schoonmaker, avoiding the former, easily makes his discourse informing and entertaining.  To meet demands for these lectures East of the Rockies, where interest in China's modernization and its influence upon Southern and Western development and American destiny has become paramount, Mr. Schoonmaker's managers have arranged to have him fill 150 engagements in Central, Southern and Western States.




PERSONAL COMMENTS.
Chester A. Arthur, President:—The best speaker in the country, I think, is F. X. Schoonmaker.  I have managed, directed or observed about all our orators, and I do not hesitate to say that he is the best equipped and the most efficient.

Shelby M. Cullom, U. S. Senator from Illinois:—I frankly say that I never heard Mr. Schoonmaker's equal as an orator.  I have heard Webster, Clay, Sumner, Phillips and all the great speakers of the country during the past half dozen decades, and not one of them in my opinion possessed in such high degree so many of the qualities essential to perfect public speaking.  He is, in my opinion, not only the most alert, most energetic, most original, entertaining and persuasive public speaker we have, but he is the greatest orator I ever heard.

Hon. John R. Tanner, Governor of Illinois:—My judgment is that F. X. Schoonmaker is the best public speaker we have.  He says more in a speech and says it more honestly and eloquently than any other orator I know of.

E. O. Wolcott, U. S. Senator from Colorado:—Mr. F. X. Schoonmaker is head and shoulders above any other orator I have ever known, both in ability and in efficiency.

Joaquin Miller:—I heard Mr. Schoonmaker at Reno, Nevada, deliver his lecture on Christ and Confucius.  He is the most eloquent man in the world.

Hon. Solomon Hirsch, ex-Minister to Turkey:—F. X. Schoonmaker is the ablest speaker ever sent into the state of Oregon.

William E. Mason, U. S. Senator from Illinois:—Of all our public speakers Schoonmaker is, in my opinion, by far the best, taking oratory in its largest sense.  In the development of a theme requiring skill in statement, correct judgment, logical reasoning, lucidity in expression, power in the marshaling of facts, persuasive grouping of conclusions and eloquence in moving towards action, he has no equal.

Ho Yow, Imperial Chinese Consul-General, San Francisco, Cal.:—I have heard Mr. Schoonmaker's lectures entitled: China, the Shadow on the World.  Every statement he makes about China, her people, her history, her institutions, her literature and art, and the moral teachings of Confucius as contrasted with the religion of Christianity, is perfectly true.  I was not only delighted to hear an American speak with such complete information about my country, but was astonished to find that there was any man in this civilization who so thoroughly understands the civilization of China.

M. R. Higgins, who managed one of Mr. Schoonmaker's California tours:—We have been besieged with requests that Mr. Schoonmaker shall return and lecture again, from every place in this state where he has already spoken.  There is nowhere his like, and as an orator he stands altogether alone.

Dr. C. N. Thomas, Thomas Lyceum Bureau, San Francisco:—Schoonmaker is an orator with a Message.  It is an extraordinary fact that the testimony of all the people who have listened to him (some of them seven times in succession) during the scores of engagements he has filled for us on the Pacific Coast and in Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, including men who have heard all the great American orators of the past sixty years, is absolutely unanimous that he is in all respects the best speaker they have ever heard.

E. Erskine McMillan, Lawyer, Treas. Fourth Baptist Church, Chicago:—Schoonmaker's lectures on China, given in our auditorium, were the best we have ever had and were delivered with the completest eloquence.  The student of oratory, to become that rare, that indefinable, that unmakable thing—a real orator, must not only master the methods acquired by this man by a life of toil; he must also possess like knowledge, like discrimination, like tact in selection, like art of statement, like voice, and a soul that, at the time of effort, will instinctively, instantly and naturally make the best possible pertinent use of everything at its disposal.

Wallace McCammant, Portland, Ore.:—Unquestionably the ablest speaker who has ever visited Oregon to make public addresses is F. X. Schoonmaker.  He differs from all other orators in method and force.

Prof. J. A. Barr, Principal High School, Stockton, Cal.:—F. X. Schoonmaker's lecture on China was the finest ever heard here.  For over two hours he held his audience spell-bound by his eloquence.

Albert Wahl, President Lincoln Club, Chicago:—F. X. Schoonmaker has changed the opinions of more people in the United States by oratory than any other living person.  All the members of the Lincoln Club pronounce his lectures on China the most informing, entertaining and eloquent they have ever heard.

Prof. Linscott, County Supt. of Schools, Santa Cruz, Cal.:—Schoonmaker's lecture on China was the finest ever heard here and we have had them all.

H. B. Taylor, Chairman Lecture Committee, San Bernardino, Cal.:—The best lecture ever heard in this place was Schoonmaker's on China.

The Register, Napa, Cal.:—The best lectures ever heared here were those delivered by Schoonmaker on China and the Chinese.

Evening Report, Virginia City, Nev.:—F. X. Schoonmaker is the most accomplished, interesting and entertaining speaker that ever visited the comstock.

Cleveland, O., Leader:—Among the accomplished orators of the country is F. X. Schoonmaker.  He is master of public economics, an accomplished gentleman and a cordial companion.  His talks are pronounced the best ever delivered here.




THE PROPHECY:—
China's Third Exodus: To Overrun the World by Labor in Manufacture.

The Homeogeneous Half of Mankind Against the Heterogeneous Half.

The Bred Labor of China Against the Unbred Labor of Christendom.


Figure


Photo by Permission Burr McIntosh Studio, New York



ARMAGEDDON?
The Labor whose Wages must Rise Against the Labor whose Wages must Fall in the Battle.

The Men who Need the Least Against the Men who Need the Most.

America to furnish the Food?  To become the Farm?  and China the Factory?  for the World?




Seattle, Wash., Times:
—The lectures of Mr. Schoonmaker on China, the Shadow on the World, contain material of absorbing interest to the American people, especially to those living in the South and West and on the Pacific Coast.  It cannot be found in libraries and was acquired during the many years of hard work, study and research spent by him as Manager in America of the Central News Co. of England, Manager of the Cable News Co., Manager of the International Telegram Co., Manager of the National Associated Press, Organizer and Manager of the United Press Association, and Foreign News Editor of the United Press and of the Associated Press, as well as while gathering together one of the finest collections in the world of examples of Chinese art in porcelain, cloisonné enamel and jade.  From years of such intense study and familiarity with Oriental affairs, Mr. Schoonmaker long ago realized that China's enormous increase in population would carry her beyond the limit in which she could feed herself. That limit was passed in 1892.  He knew that then one of two things must follow: the Chinese, pressed by want and ravenous for plunder, would emerge in vast hordes and overrun the world, as they have twice done, or their statesmen would persuade them to imitate the history of England by abandoning agriculture and adopting manufacture as the means of obtaining their food.  He saw clearly that if the statesmen prevailed the markets of the entire world would be re-distributed by Oriental competition, but that our loss would be more than compensated by the developement of the West to feed the Chinese, whose custom would enrich the United States beyond the greatest dreams of Christian statesmanship.  Mr. Schoonmaker saw through the attempt of the European powers to thwart this American aggrandisement by dismembering China before she could inaugurate her modernization, and urged an understanding between Great Britain and America for the preservation of the empire as the only field left for large Anglo-Saxonenterprise.  He was the first to realize that Dewey's victory gave the Union absolute control of the whole Pacific Ocean problem, because, with the Philippines in our custody, all attempts to dismember China must cease, as they would conflict with our interests and those of England, and there was no base now left in the Pacific for anti-Celestial operations.  Mr. Schoonmaker realizes that the events of 1897–98 will bring with speed the immense future belonging to the South, the West and the Pacific Coast—a future that must concentrate the wealth, the power and industry of Christian civilization in this region—that must give it the greatest population, the largest cities and the vastest commerce in the world.  No other person is fitted better than he to discuss this future.  He has at his tongue's end all the facts in the case, with the ability to utter them properly.  He knows his own country and he knows China.  He can tell our people just what their future customers are like; how numerous, how disposed; their necessities, their potentialities, etc., etc.  He can do more, perhaps, than any other man now living to give proper impetus and correct direction to this new trade, which is bound not only to make the West more populous than the East and to put more ships on the Pacific than now plough the Atlantic, but to do it all in a hurry.  The Atlantic commerce was built up through the slow process of competition: the Pacific trade must be hurried under the immense pressure of the demands of necessity on the part of half the human race, hungry and unable to wait.  Such lectures as those being delivered by Mr. Schoonmaker should, and undoubtedly will, stimulate immigration of people, capital and manufacturing into the Southern, Western and Pacific States and raise the value of every acre of land in the whole region.