Pittsburg was a mining town, a young men's
town. A little city with saloons and brothels doing business on every
hand. His soul was on fire for his church to do a larger work and, with
the hope of arousing his people, he conceived the idea of writing "That
Printer of Udell's," planning to read the story, by installments, on
special evenings of successive weeks, to his congregation.
Pittsburg was made the principal scene and the church of the story was
the kind of church he wanted his Pittsburg charge to be. The teachings
set forth, through the preacher of the story, in the latter half of
the book, are the identical things the author was preaching. The first
chapters of the story are very largely colored by Mr. Wright's early
life, but they are by no means autobiographical.
"That Printer of Udell's" was written without thought or intention of
offering it for publication. During the author's ministry he made some
of the warmest and most abiding friendships of his life, and it was
through certain of these friends that he was persuaded from reading the
story, as intended, but to offer it for publication, giving it, thus, a
wider usefulness.
Having a leave of absence of several weeks from his church during the
winter of 1901-2 he accepted an invitation from the pastor of a Chicago
church to hold a special meeting, and it was during this meeting
that the author and his publisher met for the first time.
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