[Father, eternal, as I draw near]

Composer: J. S. Fearis

John Sylvester Fearis, 1867-1932 Born: Feb­ru­a­ry 5, 1867, Rich­land, Io­wa. Died: Sep­tem­ber 2, 1932, Lake Ge­ne­va, Wis­con­sin. Fearis’ fa­ther was a suc­cess­ful sing­ing school teach­er, and a paint­er by trade. At a young age, John learned to read mu­sic in his fa­ther’s classe­s. He was pas­sion­ate­ly fond of mu­sic, and, tak­ing less­ons on the reed or­gan, he was soon able to play in Sun­day school and church. Lat­er he took charge of the church choir, and taught sing­ing class­es in near­by towns. He wrote his first hymn tune at age 16. He event­u­al­ly joined the ed­it­or­i­al staff of the Choir Lead­er, pub­lished by the Lo­renz Pub­lish­ing Com­pa­ny in Day­ton, Ohio.… Go to person page >