George Earl Church

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George Earl Church, painted in 1885

explorer of South America.[1]

Early life

Born in New Bedford, Massachusetts, his father was Richard Church, a direct descendant of Benjamin Church, while his mother's side was traced to a daughter of Edward Winslow, a passenger on board the Mayflower.[2] After the death of his father, aged 7 he and his mother moved to Providence, Rhode Island, where he was schooled for seven years as a civil engineer.[3]

Early career

On qualification, Church undertook various civil projects including the

Boston & Maine Railroad. In 1857 he was appointed Chief Engineer for the Argentine Great Northern Railway, based in Buenos Aires surveying a route for the government of Argentina. After delays occurred due to financial restrictions, Church joined a seven-month exploration of southern Argentina that covered 7,000 miles (11,000 km). On his return, he joined the engineering team of the Argentine Great Northern Railway.[3]

American Civil War

At the outbreak of the

11th Rhode Island Infantry
from October 1862 until July 1863.

After his military service, he was appointed chief engineer for the Fall River railway extension of Providence, Warren, and Bristol Railway.[3]

Exploration of South America

Having written on issues associated with Mexico, the

United States Government had Church appointed as war correspondent of the New York Herald in 1866. While acting as a correspondent, Church was appointed a principal military adviser of President Benito Juárez. After Juarez had secured his victory, Church unsuccessfully tried to get Washington to intervene in saving the life of Maximilian I of Mexico.[3]

He then explored the

Madeira-Mamoré Railway, one in 1870 and a second in 1878, both through the failure of sub-contractors who were blighted by malaria.[4]

Appointed United States commissioner to report on Ecuador in 1880, he then advised on railway projects in Argentina in 1889, and was then appointed United States commissioner to Costa Rica in 1895, to report on its debt and railways, with the possibility of improvements to the banana industry.[3] During this period he wrote extensively on South and Central American, its people and its geography, often in partnership with his friend Clements Markham.[5]

Later life in London

This friendship lead him to live most of the last 30 years of his life in London, England, where Church became a vice-president of the Royal Geographical Society, the first non-British citizen to become a Fellow of the Society, and the first non-British citizen to be elected to the council.[2] In 1898 he was elected president of the geographical section of the British Association.[2] In his last years, he travelled to Canada to advise on a new transcontinental railway.

Personal life

He had an illegitimate daughter with Da. Natalia Palacios Gutiérrez called Margarita, of whose existence she found out years later. He was Col. Church legitimately married in England to another lady, but later recognizes his daughter from Bolivia.

It is thanks to his efforts that the manuscripts of Bartholomé Arzans Orsúa y Vela, which remained in Europe for many years without being transcribed, were purchased from the London Museum and donated to Brown University in Rhode Island, USA (Brown University Press). who had these chronicles about Colonial Potosí printed in Mexico under the title of "History of the Imperial Villa of Potosí" in 3 luxury volumes, 60 years later, thus clarifying much of the history about the Viceroyalty of Charcas. The author owns a set of these 3 volumes. (Rolando Rivero L.). Church had met the musician and composer Olivia Sconzia, with whom he had two daughters: Blanche, born in

Florence, Italy, on February 2, 1878. He married Alice Helena Carter in 1882, and after her death in 1898, married the daughter of accountant Sir Robert Harding, Anna Marion Chapman.[3]
Church died at his home in London on January 4, 1910.

Legacy and collection

Madeira-Mamoré No. 12 "Coronel Church"

In his will, Church left his collection of over 3,500 volumes of notes and materials to Harvard University, but stipulated that the materials must be kept together. Unable to fulfil the requirement, his second choice Brown University, acquired the collection from his estate in 1912. The collection is stored in Special Collections at the John Hay Library.[3]

Church was the namesake of the

1994 television adaptation.[7]

References

  1. ^ "CHURCH, Col. George Earl". Who's Who. Vol. 59. 1907. pp. 333–334.
  2. ^
    JSTOR 1777010
    .
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i "Collections of George Church". Brown University. Archived from the original on 2010-06-05. Retrieved 2010-11-25.
  4. doi:10.1590/S0103-40142008000300008
    .
  5. ^ Church, George Earl; Markham, Clements R. Indians of South America. Chapman and Hall, London.
  6. ISBN 9788506044766
    .
  7. ^ Wilbert Awdry (1970). "Foreword". Duke the Lost Engine. Kaye & Ward.

External links

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