Goodsell, Dana

Goodsell, Dana a veteran Presbyterian minister, was born at Bradford, Connecticut, Aug. 28, 1803. He entered Princeton Seminary in 1827, and remained there over two years; began a year's service in Mississippi as agent of the American Sunday-school Union, October 8, 1830; and in the autumn of 1836 was laboring at Lowell, Massachusetts. He was ordained and installed as pastor at Plainfield, September 27, 1837, and dismissed September 25, 1839; was next installed pastor at South Amherst, Massachusetts, April 21, 1841, and after laboring there with much acceptance, was dismissed November 12, 1846. Subsequently to 1847 he travelled in the West and South, in the service of the American Tract Society, preaching to destitute churches, and distributing religious books. In failing health he next went to North Carolina, where he accumulated much property, which was lost on the opening of the civil war in 1861. He then returned to the North, and henceforth spent most of his time in Philadelphia, where he preached as opportunity offered, and engaged in other Christian labor. In his old age he lost the remainder of his property and was cast upon the charity of the world. Becoming very feeble, he was taken, June 17, 1874, to "The Old Man's Home" in West Philadelphia, where he died, February 19, 1876. Mr. Goodsell was a man of strong intellect and firm convictions, wonderfully gifted in prayer, quiet and devoted. See Necrol. Report of Princeton Theol. Sem. 1877, page 24.