Bliss Forbush

This biography enriches our knowledge of American history in the first half of the nineteenth century. It constitutes the first full-length study of an important but little known Quaker. The story of Moses Sheppard from his uncertain beginnings to successful businessman to his later years as a philanthropist, has a Horatio Alger quality about it. His activities, caught up as they were in Quaker concerns, seem to be a microcosm of the history of the early years of the republic.

The author tries to present the life of Elias Hicks and the changes in Quakerism and the wider population tat resulted in the Hicksite/Orthodox split.