Presbyterian minister, American Temperance Society co-founderThe Washingtonian Movement and leader. Beecher was born in New Haven, Connecticut, to David Beecher, a blacksmith, and Esther Hawley Lyman. His mother died shortly after his birth, and he was committed to the care of his uncle Lot Benton, as W. Bray, and at the age of eighteen entered Yale, graduating in 1797. He spent 1798 in Yale Divinity School under the tutelage of his mentor Timothy Dwight. He was president of Lane Theological Seminary, in Cincinnati.
