Frank Elwood Gordon: a lecturer of the people

              Frank Elwood Gordon
A LECTURER of THE PEOPLE


REDPATH





Frank E. Gordon



D
R. FRANK ELWOOD GORDON is a lecturer who has been given distinction not because of any superficial publicity, but because of a genuine service that he has rendered to many hundreds of communities.  There is nothing superficial about Gordon.  His instincts are very true to human nature and his understanding of people is most direct indeed.




If the Manager of this Bureau were asked to name a single qualification that is most important in the equipment of a lecturer, his answer would unhesitatingly be 
Sincerity.
  Sincerity is not enough to be sure to justify a man's appearance upon the platform, but regardless of a speaker's intellectual attainment and oratorical ability, he falls far short of success if he is not sincere.




Here is a man who is tremendously and indeed dramatically in earnest.  His deep interest in people and in communities is based upon a very direct and clear understanding of human hearts.  He has never lost faith in people, nor does he ever lose interest in the ordinary things of life.




You will always find him at work, not at his study table alone, but in railroad stations, on trains, as he drives through the country, and as he walks down the street.  To him the study of life and humanity is a very wonderful and glorious subject.  He makes progress because he is not encumbered by superfluous details in his thinking.  He lays his argument upon fundamental principles and he arrives at his conclusions by means of a logic that is as direct as it is simple, and his reasoning is good because it is so direct.




For nine years Gordon was a teacher, a principal or a county superintendent of schools.  He has been a preacher for a number of years.  A good share of the time for the last eight years has been spent upon the lecture platform, but this is the first time that he has temporarily given up his pastorate to devote the whole year to the lecture platform.




Gordon is presented as a lecturer of the people.  His benevolence, his sincerity, his faithfulness to ideals, the kindliness of purpose, and the simplicity of manner that characterize him and his lectures, quite justify the title that has been given him.




As a speaker he is plain spoken but never rude.  His diction is excellent and at times beautiful.  He is very skillful as a word painter and he has a very interesting sense of humor.




The Wakefield, Kansas, News, said:


It would take pages to tell all the good things in the two lectures of Dr. Gordon.  He is a veritable cyclone in his logic and force * *.




The Howard County Citizen, Howard, Kansas, printed this:


Dr. F. E. Gordon delivered one of the strongest lectures ever delivered in the five years' history of the Howard Chautauqua.  Many believe it was the best lecture ever delivered here.  Dr. Gordon's lecture on Six Cylinder Living would be worth millions to the men and youth of America if he could reach them.




At Alliance, Nebraska, the Alliance Herald reported the following:


All of the lectures and addresses during the Chautauqua were good, but it is no disparagement to the others to say that Dr. Gordon's was one of the best of the series and one of the best ever delivered in this city.




The Kingman Journal of Kingman, Kansas, had this to say of him:


The crowning treat of Commencement Week was the address Friday evening by Dr. Frank Elwood Gordon.  It differed in many respects from anything previously heard here on a similar occasion and notably in the keenness of interest that pervaded it from beginning to end.  During the time he spoke there was not one uninteresting moment.  It would be impossible to quote the one-hundredth part of the solid thoughts presented by Dr. Gordon.  But his is an address that will be remembered by both class and audience for many a day to come.




Dr. Gordon is particularly needed at this time.  In facing the perplexing problems of his day, his treatment of our needs are based on fundamentals, because he sees the need for the application of fundamental truths of life if we are to solve the problems of the day.




There is inspiration, joy, goodwill, brotherly love, and seed for thought in every lecture which he delivers.




Some of his subjects are 
The Fruitage of Ideals,
 and 
Shooting the Goal.




—REDPATH—