Memoir of George Br 07 en C^oode. 59 



the time of his death of president in the local society. He stinuilated 

 this society to issue historical publications, and saw a number through the 

 press himself. A society known as the Sons of the Revolution having 

 been founded with somewhat similar aims, Mr. Goode joined this organi- 

 zation with the avowed purpose of bringing them together. In this society 

 he held the office of vice-president. He w^as lieutenant-governor of the 

 Society of Colonial Wars of the District of Columbia. He gave constant 

 advice to the Daughters of the American Revolution during the period 

 of their organization, and was instrumental in having the State of Massa- 

 chusetts present, as a home for the Daughters of the American Revolu- 

 tion in Georgia, its building at the Atlanta Exposition, which was a copy 

 of the old Craigie house in Cambridge, once occupied by Washington 

 as his headquarters, and later the residence of Longfellow. The success 

 of this effort gave him special pleasure, for he regarded it as one of the 

 means for promoting friendliness between the people of New England 

 and the people of the South. 



Although these numerous duties and activities would seem to have been 

 more than enough for any single man, Mr. Goode did not stop here. 

 Every scientific activity of the Government had at some time or other 

 the advantage of his wise counsel and his active cooperation. His public 

 duties outside of the Smithsonian in connection with the Department of 

 State, the Fish Commission, the census, and the various expositions 

 abroad at which he represented his Government I have already alluded 

 to ; but he w^as possessed of a higher order of patriotism which even 

 this service did not satisfy. Mr. William L. Wilson, Regent of the 

 Smithsonian Institution, lately Postmaster-General of the United States, 

 and president of Washington and Lee University, says : 



He was a richly endowed man, first, with that capacity and that resistless bent 

 toward the work in which he attained his great distinction that made it a perennial 

 delight to him; but he was scarcely less richly endowed in his more unpretending 

 and large human sympathies, and it was this latter that distinguished him as a 

 citizen and a historian. 



As a citizen he was full of patriotic American enthusiasm. He understood, as all 

 must understand who look with seriousness upon the great problems that confront a 

 free people and who measure the difficulties of those problems — he understood that 

 at least one preparation for the discharge of the duties of American citizenship was 

 the general education of the people, and so he advocated as far as possible bringing 

 within the reach of all the people not only the opportunities but the attractions 

 and the incitements to intellectual living. 



Doctor Goode, with the quick and warm sympathies of the man and of the histo- 

 rian, seems to have felt that he could do no greater service to the people of his day 

 and generation and to his country than in the most attractive and concrete way, if I 

 may so express it, to lead the young men of this country to the study of the history 

 of the past, to the deeds and the writings of the great men to whom we owe the 

 foundation and the perpetuation of our institutions. 



He was greatly interested in the establishment of a national university, 

 and in 1891 read a paper in Philadelphia, afterwards printed in the 



