Introduction
Born: October 22, 1833, Brooklyn, Connecticut.
Died: November 2, 1913, Northfield, Minnesota (Findagrave; Wikipedia says Mexico City).
Buried: Glendale Cemetery, Akron, Ohio.
Born: October 22, 1833, Brooklyn, Connecticut.
Died: November 2, 1913, Northfield, Minnesota (Findagrave; Wikipedia says Mexico City).
Buried: Glendale Cemetery, Akron, Ohio.
Emily was the daughter of Methodist pastor Thomas Huntington and Paulina Clark, and wife of John Edwin Miller (married 1860).
She attended Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio. She helped edit The Little Corporal, a children’s magazine, and in the 1890’s was Dean of Women Students at Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois.
Publications most often give her name as Emily Huntington Miller.
We have seen her middle initial (‘C’) only twice. It appears in the Oberlin Students’ Monthly, volume 1, issue 1 (Shankland & Harmon, 1859), pages 156–58, on a secular song titled Jubilati, with Words by Miss Emily C. Huntington.
The initial makes another appearance in The River of Life, edited by Henry Perkins & Warren Bentley (New York; Boston, Massachusetts; and Chicago, Illinois: Oliver Ditson, C. H. Ditson and Lyon & Healy, 1873), page 89, in the author credit for The Beautiful Home Above.
She was a prolific writer: In addition to the works listed below, her poem Lilly’s Secret, which appeared in The Little Corporal magazine in December 1865, became the basis for the lyrics to the song Jolly Old Saint Nicholas. The song has been recorded by many artists, including Ray Smith, Chet Atkins, Eddy Arnold, The Chipmunks, Andy Williams, Anne Murray, and Carole King.
Sweet Mary! Mother of my Lord!
Through the faint light thy pictured face,
Touched with the glory and the grace
Born of the Angel’s wondrous word,
Draws my eyes upward to its place.
What dost thou dream, O woman dear,
So late a child, whose careless feet
Found the green paths of girlhood sweet,
Nor guessed what rapture, drawing near,
Would fold thy heart in bliss complete?
They ponder much, these mother souls
That clasp their secret close, nor tell
The strange, exulting thoughts that swell,
A soundless tide, whose fullness rolls
To shores where blessed visions dwell.
And since that hour when first for thee
The hope of all the ages smiled,
And love and loss were reconciled,
No mother’s heart but thrills to see
A world’s redeemer in her child.
Sweet Mary, if some glistening wing
Showed through the darkness, dim and pale,
And angel voices cried, All hail!
Lo, the swift days to thee shall bring,
Brimmed with love’s wine, life’s holy grail,
I think I should but lift mine eyes,
And see again thy radiant face
Shine, still and tender, from its place,
And, grown like thee, serene and wise,
Should thank my Lord for that dear grace.
Emily Clark Huntington Miller
From Avalon, and Other Poems, 1896