Boston-born Baptist minister and academic best known as the lyricist of “America” (“My Country ’Tis of Thee”), written while he was a student at Andover Theological Seminary. Smith’s stirring patriotic song, set to the same melody as the British national anthem (“God Save the Queen”), served as a de facto national anthem for much of the nineteenth century. Original nineteenth-century souvenir printing of a poem titled “Century Hymn, April 30, 1889” on an off-white 7.5 x 10.5 sheet, signed at the conclusion, “S. F. Smith.” The sheet also bears the printed caption, “Authentic copy, kindly attested by the author’s autograph, for the Davenport Academy of Natural Sciences, June 3, 1889.” In fine condition, with sheet lightly affixed to a piece of mat board, light folds and scattered wrinkles, mild soiling, trimming to right edge, and collector’s ink notation to lower margin which can easily be matted out. R&R COA.
