Literature and the Arts
Charles Brockden Brown of Philadelphia was the first American novelist of distinction
and the first to follow a purely literary career. Hugh Henry Brackenridge of Pittsburgh
gave the American West its first literary work in his satire Modern Chivalry.
Philadelphia continued as an important center for printing with J. B. Lippincott
taking the lead and, for magazines, with the publication of the Saturday Evening Post.
Bayard Taylor, who began his literary career before the Civil War, published his
most notable work in 1870-71 the famous translation of Goethe's Faust.
In architecture, the red brick construction of southeastern Pennsylvania was
supplemented by buildings in the Greek Revival style. The New England influence
was strong in the domestic architecture of the northern tier counties. Thomas
U. Walter and William Strickland gave Pennsylvania an important place in the
architectural history of the early 1800s. Walter designed the Treasury Building
and the Capitol dome in Washington. The nation's first institution of art, the
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, was founded in Philadelphia in 1805, although
by then, such painters as Gilbert Stuart, Benjamin West, and the Peale family had
already made Philadelphia famous.
Philadelphia was the theatrical center of America until 1830, a leader in music
publishing and piano manufacture, and the birthplace of American opera. William Henry
Fry's Lenora (1845) was probably the first publicly performed opera by an American
composer. Stephen Foster became the songwriter for the nation.
Religion
In the years between independence and the Civil War, religion flourished in
the Commonwealth. In addition to the growth of worship, religion led the way
to enlargement of the educational system. In this period, churches threw off
European ties and established governing bodies in the United States. In 1789,
John Carroll of Maryland became the first Catholic bishop in America. In 1820,
the establishment of a national Lutheran synod was the last of the breaks from
Europe by a major Protestant denomination. Some new churches were formed:
Jacob Albright formed the Evangelical Association, a Pennsylvania German
parallel to Methodism; Richard Allen formed the African Methodist
Episcopal Church in 1816; and John Winebrenner founded the Church of
God in Harrisburg in 1830. Isaac Leeser, who founded Conservative Judaism in America,
did most of his important writing in Philadelphia in this period. Presbyterianism,
which was the largest Protestant denomination before 1860, drifted westward and had
its stronghold in western Pennsylvania. Quakers, although decreasing in number,
led many humanitarian and reform movements. Although anti-Catholic riots occurred
at Kensington in 1844, German and Irish immigrants enlarged the number of Catholics
in the state.
