The Biographical Dictionary of America/Allen, William (educator)

ALLEN, William, educator, was born in Pittsfield, Mass., Jan. 2, 1784, son of Thomas Allen, a clergyman. He was a direct descendant of Governor Bradford on his father's side. He was graduated at Harvard college in 1802, studied theology, and in 1804 was licensed to preach and was first stationed in western New York. While holding the position of assistant librarian at Harvard college, he began the '"American Biographical and Historical Dictionary" (1809), which was the first work of the kind published in the United States, and which he revised and enlarged from the original seven hundred American names to eighteen hundred names in 1832, and seven thousand names in 1857. He was called from his work as a librarian in 1810 to preach as successor to his father in Pittsfield, where he remained seven years. In 1817 he was appointed president of Dartmouth college, and in 1819 of Bowdoin college. He served Bowdoin for nineteen years, retiring at the age of fifty-five, in order to devote himself to literary pursuits. He contributed to a new edition of Webster's dictionary ten thousand words not before given. He wrote: "Junius Unmasked" (1828); "Memoirs of Dr. Eleazar Wheelock and of Dr. John Codman" (1853); "A Discourse at the close of the Second Century of the Settlement at Northampton, Mass." (1854); "Wunnissoo, or the Vale of Housatonnuck," a poem (1856); " Christian Sonnets " (1860); "Poems of Nazareth and the Cross" (1866); "Sacred Songs" (1867). His "Life with selections from his Correspondence," was published in Philadelphia in 1847. He died at Northampton, Mass., July 16, 1868.