Phillips Brooks
Notes: ~ This popular Christmas carol was written by Phillips Brooks and Lewis H. Redner in 1868. Brooks, pastor of the Holy Trinity Church in Philadelphia, visited Jerusalem and Bethlehem in December 1865. Three years later the impressions of Bethlehem remained clear in his mind. In early December 1868, Brooks wrote a five-stanza poem (modern hymnals omit the third stanza) about Bethlehem. He asked his church organist and Sunday school superintendent, Lewis Redner, to write music to the poem. Redner wrote the music on the night of December 26-27, 1868. That Sunday morning (the 27th), "O Little Town of Bethlehem" was sung for the first time by a chorus composed of six Sunday school teachers and thirty-six children. Originally, Brooks called his Christmas carol "St. Louis" - a different spelling of Lewis Redner's first name. |
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