1845 - 1919 Author of "We Shall Greet Them at Home" in Songs for Service Lorenzo Dow Santee, 1845-1919. Lorenzo Santee, a pioneer Seventh-day Adventist minister, served as a pastor in the state of Kansas and in Chicago and Moline, Kansas. He was also a writer and poet whose poem "When the King Shall Claim His Own" became the words for "In the Glad time of Harvest," Hymn #539 in the 1941 Seventh-day Adventist Church Hymnal.
Lorenzo was born in Hornell, New York, on September 19, 1845, and raised in Steuben County, New York, near Hornell, the oldest of twelve children of James Moore and Celina Coal Santee. He and his parents accepted the doctrine of the second coming of Christ and the SDA interpretation of Revelation 14 when he was very young. He moved to Illinois in his late teens, attended Tremont College and then taught for a short while in public schools before marrying Alice Merritt on March 4, 1869, at age 23. They would have six children, one son and five daughters.
Santee was ordained in 1876 by James White and then traveled to Kansas, where he started his ministry. Known as a gentle, thoughtful man without pretense, he particularly enjoyed writing articles and poetry, many of which were published in the Review and Herald in the 1880s, 1890s, and early 1900s. "In the Glad Time of Harvest," with music by Edwin Barnes, music teacher at Battle Creek College, was first published in the 1888 Hymns and Tunes, as hymn #1332, along with the words for two other hymns by Santee (#188 and "302).
The Santees were residing in Pasadena, California, when Alice died on August 10, 1917, at age 67. Lorenzo died two years later, on September 3, 1919, at age 73.
email sent to Hymnary Sources: Obituary, Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, 23 October 1919, 22; Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia, Volume 11, Second Revised Edition, 1996, (Review and Herald Publishing Association) 542.
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