Edward L.R. Elson

The Reverend Edward L. R. Elson (December 23, 1906 -
August 25, 1993) was a Presbyterian minister and
Chaplain of the United States Senate.

Edward Lee Roy Elson, the oldest of nine children, was born in
Monongahela, Pennsylvania, to Leroy Elson, a locomotive engineer,and his wife, Pearl. Early on he was encouraged to study music andgave concerts in the Pittsburgh area on the cornet with his sisterHazel playing the piano. One of his favorite memories of high schoolwas the time he and his sister gave a concert in the very early daysof radio on KDKA, the pioneer radio station.

Dr. Elson was educated at Asbury College in Wilmore, Kentucky,and then went to University of Southern California for a master'sin theology. He married Frances Sandys, a fellow Asbury Collegestudent in 1929. At about the time of his ordination in 1930, helearned that his young wife had a very serious illness, and owinglargely to this, he chose to go and serve at the La Jolla PresbyterianChurch because of its proximity to the
Scripps Clinic in La Jolla, California. His wife diedthree years later on his birthday.

Having been invited to join the American Seminar in Europe and Russia, Elson took an eye-opening trip to Europe in the summer of 1936. Shortly after returning from Europe, Elson married Helen Chittick, a member of his church.

After having been in the chaplain reserves for ten years, he resignedhis position with the church and went on active duty with the Army in1941, arriving in France in December 1944. Not long after, GeneralFrank Wilburn requested that Elson be his personal representative atthe execution by firing squad of a soldier for desertion. Thissoldier, Eddie Slovik, was the first to be so executed by theAmerican military since the American Civil War. Another of his wartimeassignments was tointerview members of the clergy who had been imprisoned at
Dachau. After the German surrender, hewas asked to represent Dwight D. Eisenhower before the Consistory, a rulingbody of the German Protestant church, in order to determine how theGerman Church would be rebuilt.

Upon returning to the U.S. from the war, he soon learned that he was acandidate for the pastorate of the Covenant-First Presbyterian Churchin Washington, D.C. and ultimately became its pastor in 1946. Oneof his first duties there was to oversee the transition of theCovenant-First Presbyterian Church to the National PresbyterianChurch, a move that had been in the works for many years.Eisenhower attended a pre-inaugural service at the church. A fewdays later, on February 1, 1953, Dr. Elson baptized the president andadmitted him to formal membership of the church. The baptism cameafter the president's brother, Milton, confirmed that though Ike hadregularly attended the River Brethren Church in
Abilene, Kansas, he had never officially joined the churchnor had he been baptized. In the 1960s, Elson oversaw, along withthe building committee, the construction of a large new church, whichwas dedicated in 1967 on Eisenhower's birthday, October 14.

In 1967, he was named to a special committee of the PresbyterianGeneral Assembly to study the Vietnam War. In September 1967, whilehe and his wife were still at their summer home in
Cape Breton Island, he received a phone call from the White House asking him to be on a team to observe the upcoming elections in
South Viet Nam.

Dr. Elson was elected to the position of
Chaplain of the United States Senate in 1969, retiring from that position after having served for alittle over twelve years in February, 1981. During his tenure at theSenate, he invited the first woman, Wilmina Rowland, to offer theopening prayer.

Works

*"America's Spiritual Recovery", 1954
*"And Still He speaks, The words of the Risen Christ", 1960
*"Inevitable encounter", 1962
*"Prayers offered by the chaplain of the Senate of the United States/ Edward L.R. Elson, at the opening of the daily sessions of theUnited States Senate during the 96th and 97th congresses, 1979-1981",1980
*"Prayers offered by the chaplain of the Senate of the United States/ Edward L.R. Elson, during the Ninety-second Congress, 1971-72",1973
*"Wide was His Parish, An Autobiography", 1986

References

*"Wide was His Parish, An Autobiography", Tyndale Press, 1986 - ISBN0-8423-8205-4

External links

* [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE5D6103EF93BA1575BC0A965958260 New York Times Obituary]
* [http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/relelson.htm Arlington Cemetery website]
* [http://www.natpresch.org/history.php History of National Presbyterian Church]
* [http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Senate_Chaplain.htm Senate Chaplains on Senate Website]
* [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/22/AR2007082202684_pf.html Obituary for Helen C. Elson]