Preuss, Edward F. b. 1834 (?); Konigsberg (East Prussia), Prussia d. 1904 (?); St. Louis, Missouri
German American journalist and editor of the Die Amerika, which was the largest and most successful German Catholic daily in the United States. Raised as a devout Lutheran, he earned a doctoral degree in philosophy from the University of Konigsberg in 1853 and a doctoral degree in theology from the University of Berlin four years later.
He then spent the next ten years as a tutor at the University of Berlin, numbering among his students some members of the Prussian royal family. He was also well acquainted with some of the most prominent men in Berlin, including Otto von Bismarck and the historians Theodor Mommsen and Leopold von Ranke.As an orthodox Lutheran, Preuss published a polemical book refuting the Catholic dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1865. Ironically, this work soon involved Preuss in theological controversies with liberal Protestant contemporaries over the rationalistic theology that divided the evangelical churches. His vehement defense of Lutheran orthodoxy alienated him from his colleagues at the University of Berlin, and by December 1868 he felt compelled to resign his position. Shortly thereafter, Preuss left Germany for the United States to take a teaching position at the theologically conservative Concordia Lutheran Seminary in St. Louis, where he was assigned to teach courses in exegesis, church history, and Hebrew.
However, Preuss’s previous involvement in controversies with liberal Protestant theologians had undermined his faith in Lutheranism. After an intense personal struggle, Preuss resigned his position at Concordia Seminary on December 1, 1871, and seven days later, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception, left behind the Lutheran fold forever. Preuss was baptized into the Roman Catholic Church by the German vicar general of the archdiocese of St. Louis, the Reverend Henry Muehlsiepen, on January 26, 1872.
Preuss’s talents were soon put to use when he was appointed assistant editor of St. Louis’s daily Catholic newspaper, Die Amerika, which began publication on October 17, 1872. Although he did not formally assume the editorship of Die Amerika until January 17, 1878, he had been the de facto editor from the start. Under his editorship, Die Amerika became the largest and most successful German Catholic daily in the United States. Approximate circulation figures indicate that Die Amerika started with 3,000 subscribers and had reached a circulation of 13,000 subscribers by 1895 (Willging and Hatzfeld 1965, 21). In 1902 ill health forced Preuss to retire from his position as editor. Recognized as the central organ of the German Catholics in the United States, Die Amerika was actively involved in the Abbelen Memorial and Cahensly controversies of the 1880s and 1890s, which concerned the continued use of the German language in the church in the United States.
Rory T Conley
See also Cahensly, Peter Paul; Newspaper Press, German Language in the United States
References and Further Reading
Barry, Colman, O.S.B. The Catholic Church and German Americans. Milwaukee: Bruce, 1953.
Conley, Rory T Arthur Preuss, Journalist and Voice of German and Conservative Catholics in America, 1871—1934. New York: Peter Lang, 1998.
Gleason, Philip J. The Conservative Reformers German-American Catholics and the Social Order. University of Notre Dame, 1968.
Willging, Eugene, and Herta Hatzfeld.
Catholic Serials of the Nineteenth Century in the United States. Washington, DC, 1965.