Jedidiah Morse (August 23, 1761June 9, 1826) was a geographer whose textbooks became a staple for students in the United States. He was the father of the telegraphy pioneer and painter Samuel Morse, and his textbooks earned him the sobriquet of "father of American geography." Early life and education Born to a New England family in Woodstock, Connecticut: Jedidiah Morse and Sarah Child, Morse did his undergraduate work and earned a divinity degree at Yale University (M.A. 1786). While pursuing his theological studies under Jonathan Edwards and Samuel Watts, he established a school for young women in 1783 in New Haven. Career In the summer of 1785, he was licensed to preach, but continued to occupy himself with teaching. He became a tutor at Yale in June 1786, but, resigning this office, was ordained on November 9, 1786, and settled in Midway, Georgia, where he remained until August of the following year. He spent the winter of 1787 and 1788 in New Haven in geographical work, preaching on Sundays to vacant parishes in the vicinity. Religious activities Morse became a pastor in Charlestown, Boston (across Boston harbor) on April 30, 1789, where he served until 1820. Among his friends and numerous correspondents were Noah Webster, Benjamin Silliman and Jeremy Belknap. In 1795, he received the degree of D.D. from the University of Edinburgh. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1796. Throughout his life, Morse was much occupied with religious controversy, and in upholding the faith of the New England church against the assaults of Unitarianism. Ultimately his persevering opposition to liberal views of religion brought on him a persecution that affected deeply his naturally delicate health. He was very active in 1804 in the movement that resulted in enlarging the Massachusetts general assembly of Congregational ministers, and in 1805 unsuccessfully opposed, as a member of the board of overseers, the election of Henry Ware to the Hollis Chair of Divinity at Harvard. Morse did much toward securing the foundation of Andover Theological Seminary, especially by his successful efforts in preventing the establishment of a rival institution in West Newbury which had been projected by the Hopkinsians (chiefly Samuel Spring and Leonard Woods, with the financial backing of William Bartlett). He participated in the organization of the Park Street Church in Boston in 1808, when all the Congregational churches of that city, except