TYPED LETTER SIGNED BY THE REV. DONALD SAGE MACKAY, PASTOR OF ST. NICHOLAS COLLEGIATE CHURCH, THANKING MAJOR POND FOR LECTURE TICKETS AND PRAISING POND'S BOOK.

Mackay writes to Major J. B. Pond of the Pond Lecture Bureau, New York City, thanking him for giving his family the opportunity to hear a lecture the previous day. He adds; "I have never told you, but one of the most delightful books which I read last summer was your "Eccentricities of Genius". It is a charming volume, and you did well to publish it. The side lights which it casts upon the characters of well known men are strikingly suggestive".

Born in Scotland, Donald Sage Mackay [1863-1908] graduated as a lawyer from the University of Glasgow but found a calling to be a minister. Visiting America in 1889 with a letter of introduction to the Governor of Vermont, he was invited to become the pastor of the First Congregational Church in St. Alban's. After five years in St. Alban's and another five years as pastor of the North Reformed Church in Newark, N.J. Mackay had gained a reputation as a charismatic preacher and community leader. In 1900 he was invited to become pastor of St. Nicholas Collegiate Reformed Protestant Dutch Church in New York City. He remained there for the last eight years of his life. President Theodore Roosevelt attended the church when he was in New York City. Mackay died of pneumonia at the youthful age of 44.