The New York Times, January 30, 1927. PAGE NUMBER 71
TRIBUTES TO THOMAS PAINE
Historical Association Honors His Memory at a Dinner.
Members of the Thomas Paine National Historical Association attended last night a dinner at the Hotel Martinique in honor of the 190th anniversary of Paine’s birth. Speakers included Professor Nelson Prentiss Mead, of City College; William D. Bosler, lawyer; Horace W. Corey, Vice President of the Association Against the Prohibition Amendment, and the Rev. Dr. A. Wakefield Slaten, pastor of the West Side Unitarian Church. All of the speakers lauded the part Paine played in shaping public opinion at the time of the American Revolution and declared that he had been misnamed an atheist.
Thomas A. Edison, who is a Vice President of the association, sent a letter which said in part:
“Many efforts have been made, both in Paine’s lifetime and since, to obliterate from the world his name and the eternal truths which he uttered, but the name and the work of a great man like Paine cannot be stamped out at will, and today Paine’s name shines brighter than ever before, and the world has grown stronger and wiser by reading and heeding his rational message.”
The President of the association, William M. Van Der Weyde, presided.