Edward Everett Hale

Edward Everett Hale (1822–1909) was born in Boston into a prominent New England family — his great-uncle was Revolutionary War martyr Nathan Hale — and was ordained as a Unitarian minister, serving Boston-area congregations for most of his career while writing prolifically on the side. He is best remembered for "The Man Without a Country" (1863), a patriotic Civil War-era short story about an army officer sentenced never to hear his own country's name again, published anonymously to bolster Union sentiment and widely believed true by many contemporary readers; "The Brick Moon" (1869), an early work of science fiction imagining an artificial satellite built to aid navigation, anticipated the idea by nearly a century. A committed social reformer, he was elected chaplain of the United States Senate in 1903. He died in Roxbury, Massachusetts, at eighty-seven.