Edwin Henry Wilson (August 23, 1898 – March 26, 1993) was an American Unitarian leader and humanist who helped draft the Humanist Manifesto. Wilson was born on August 23, 1898, in Woodhaven,

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * ...

. He was raised in

Concord, Massachusetts Concord () is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, in the United States. At the 2020 census, the town population was 18,491. The United States Census Bureau considers Concord part of Greater Boston. The town center is near where the conflu ...

and graduated from the

Meadville Theological School The Meadville Lombard Theological School is a Unitarian Universalist seminary in Chicago, Illinois. History Meadville Lombard is a result of a merger in the 1930s between two institutions, a Unitarian seminary and a Universalist seminary. M ...

in 1926. In 1928 he was ordained and became a practicing Unitarian minister in Dayton, Ohio. One of the activities during his four-year tenure at the First Unitarian Church of Dayton was to publish the national Unitarian newsletter "Dawn." At his next church, the Third Unitarian Church of Chicago, he continued to publish this newsletter until 1941. He later served churches in Schenectady, New York; Yellow Springs, Ohio; Salt Lake City, Utah; and Cocoa Beach, Florida. During the 1980s he returned to Dayton to serve as the First Unitarian Church's Minister Emeritus until 1988. By 1930 Wilson was the managing editor of ''The New Humanist,'' which published the first Humanist Manifesto in 1933. In 1941 he became the first editor of the ''Humanist'' magazine and one of the founders of the American Humanist Association. Wilson was one of the primary authors of both the Humanist Manifesto I of 1933 and

Humanist Manifesto II ''Humanist Manifesto II'', written in 1973 by humanists Paul Kurtz and Edwin H. Wilson, was an update to the previous ''Humanist Manifesto'' published in 1933, and the second entry in the ''Humanist Manifesto'' series. It begins with a stateme ...

of 1973. In 1952, he participated in the foundation of the

International Humanist and Ethical Union Humanists International (known as the International Humanist and Ethical Union, or IHEU, from 1952–2019) is an international non-governmental organisation championing secularism and human rights, motivated by secular humanist values. Foun ...

. He was named the 1979 Humanist of the Year by the

American Humanist Association The American Humanist Association (AHA) is a non-profit organization in the United States that advances secular humanism. The American Humanist Association was founded in 1941 and currently provides legal assistance to defend the constitution ...

. His book, ''The Genesis of the Humanist Manifesto,'' was published after his death, edited by Teresa Maciocha.

References

External links

The Genesis of a Humanist ManifestoEdwin H.Wilson Papers of the American Humanist Association, 1913-1989
at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Special Collections Research Center 1898 births 1993 deaths American humanists American Unitarians People from Woodhaven, Queens People from Concord, Massachusetts {{US-reli-bio-stub