Above are pictures of Ada R. Habershon and Charles H. Gabriel. Ada wrote the original lyrics for Will the Circle be Unbroken and Charles but music to them. It was written in 1907.
Ada Ruth Habershon was born on January 8, 1861, in Rotherham, Yorkshire, England. She died February 1, 1918. Ada was the youngest daughter of Dr. Samuel Osborne Habershon. She was brought up in a Christian home by believing, praying parents, and her whole life was devoted to God’s service. In 1901, she began writing poetry while ill and wrote “Apart with Him.” She met Dwight Moody and Ira Sankey when they visited London in 1884 and, visited America at their invitation to deliver lectures on the Old Testament, which were later published. During the 1905 Torrey-Alexander Mission, Charles Alexander asked her to write some Gospel songs; within a year, she supplied him with 200.
These are her original lyrics to the hymn:
There are loved ones in the glory,
Whose dear forms you often miss;
When you close your earthly story,
Will you join them in their bliss?
Will the circle be unbroken
By and by, by and by?
In a better home awaiting
In the sky, in the sky?
In the joyous days of childhood,
Oft they told of wondrous love,
Pointed to the dying Savior
Now they dwell with Him above.
You remember songs of heaven
Which you sang with childish voice,
Do you love the hymns they taught you,
Or are songs of earth your choice?
You can picture happy gatherings
Round the fireside long ago,
And you think of tearful partings,
When they left you here below:
One by one their seats were emptied,
One by one they went away;
Here the circle has been broken—
Will it be complete one day?
3 comments:
This is a wonderful post, Fredrik. Comes as a revelation--so many of the songs we think of as "folk" were , of course, written and published in some early version--and then struck such a chord (no pun intended) that they became invaluable--and, by the same token, anonymous.
Red River Valley, for example. And Merle Travis' "Dark as a Dugeon"--written by light of a street lamp while sitting in his car with a date--in LA, sometime in the late '40s. The song (one of our best) became anonymous almost instantly...!
This is a wonderful post, Fredrik. Comes as a revelation--so many of the songs we think of as "folk" were , of course, written and published in some early version--and then struck such a chord (no pun intended) that they became invaluable--and, by the same token, anonymous.
Red River Valley, for example. And Merle Travis' "Dark as a Dugeon"--written by light of a street lamp while sitting in his car with a date--in LA, sometime in the late '40s. The song (one of our best) became anonymous almost instantly...!
Thanks for posting this, Fredrik. I've been wondering about the meaning of that "circle," and, more importantly, about the term "unbroken." Having read the original text (which I tried to find but couldn't), it's more clear now: It is death on Earth that breaks the "circle," and salvation into the Heavens that "un"breaks it, thus reuniting us with our loved ones, provided we lived a pious life... Accordingly, the "circle" seems to refer to the circle of loved ones, i.e., one's family, rather than -- as I initially thought -- to the life cycle itself, which can't really be "un"broken...
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