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Praise for American Priestess

“This is a huge book in scope… the story of an indomitable woman who, through endurance, will, and personal magnetism, became [the American Colony's leader] unmanning all rivals and creating a fiefdom for her family out of a band of seekers… A triumph… it continues into World War I and the last cruel days of the Ottoman Empire, on to the mess created by the Balfour Declaration, to the influx of Zionist settlers, World War II, the bloody birth of the State of Israel, on to 1967 and the occupation of the West Bank.”—The Boston Globe

“The Jerusalem years have the quality of a Hollywood epic, complete with an appearance by Lawrence of Arabia himself. Mystics and madmen, the odor of the hookah, the polyglot souk–I'd love to buy the film rights.” —The New York Times Sunday Book Review

“A vivid portrait of both a woman and a region on the cusp of transformation.” —Booklist

“Geniesse’s prose powerfully re-creates the terrors of shipwreck and of living through fire and war as well as the sights, sounds, and smells of everyday life in Chicago and Old Jerusalem. In Anna Spafford, Geniesse has created a charismatic, complex, and commanding figure as compelling as any fictive heroine.”—Sena Jeter Naslund, author of Ahab’s Wife

“An engaging and enlightening account… The author’s fascinating psychological profiles of Horatio and, especially Anna, dovetail seamlessly with her account of the Overcomers’ rise and inevitable demise.” —Louisville Courier-Journal

“It is surprising and ironic that although the American Colony Hotel is favored by visiting journalists, none has ever before written a book about its unusual origins. Geniesse has now ably filled that gap.”—The Jerusalem Post

“Colorful… A fascinating insight into the upsurge in the late 1800s of ‘pre-millennial’ religious movements… American Priestess is a great read—well written, thoroughly researched, and full of fascinating anecdotes.” —Internet Review of Books

“[A] fascinating story of the Spaffords and their quixotic enterprise.”—The Washington Times

“Geniesse relates a tale that is as sweeping and epic in its scope as anything Edna Ferber wrote and has the additional advantage of being true…

It is hard to imagine a family, Jewish, Christian or Muslim, who has been more directly involved in the tragic upheavals Jerusalem has faced in the last century and a half.

Jane Fletcher Geniesse has spun a fantastic tale–though not as fantastic as what the original American Colony members hoped for.”—The Free Press (Rockland, Maine)

“I have stayed often at the American Colony and never imagined it had such a history! Jane Geniesse presents a vivid picture of a dedicated cult's search for answers in the Holy Land and of the tense relationship between religious groups in Jerusalem, confirming her zest for storytelling.”—Janet Wallach, author of Desert Queen, the Extraordinary Life of Gertrude Bell

“It takes Jane Geniesse to put together the intriguing, improbable, and historically rich tale of Anna Spafford. This is a well-crafted read for adventurers, for the curious of mind, and especially for aficionados of the Middle East and the American Colony in Jerusalem.”—Hedrick Smith, author of The Russians and The Power Game

“This carefully researched book tells with considerable verve a history that is eminently relevant at this time of American hyper-religiosity.” —Andrew Solomon, author of The Noonday Demon

“Geniesse takes us into the shocking past of the most famous American family in Jerusalem. Readers will be riveted by the dark side of this venerable clan.” —Leslie Cockburn, co-director of American Casino

 

Jane Fletcher Geniesse

“Jane Geniesse has proved there is definitely a second act. Her American Priestess follows naturally like another jewel from Passionate Nomad. Her story of Anna Spafford's multi-layered journey from Chicago to Jerusalem and beyond is stunning--impressively researched and beautifully told.”
— Jim Lehrer

For generations, a fabled mansion has been the residence of choice for foreign correspondents, diplomats, pilgrims and spies coming to Jerusalem—but until now, few knew the true story of the palatial establishment that became the American Colony Hotel or its bizarre history of tragedy, religious extremism, emotional blackmail, and peculiar sexual practices.

In Chicago, during the boom years following the Civil War, Horatio Spafford was a prominent lawyer caught up in a mighty wave of Protestant evangelism deluging the nation and drawing millions of citizens to revival tents. Like his well-heeled friends and business associates, Horatio believed the solution to social unrest was to bring the poor and unemployed to Christ. Once these vagrants, newcomers, or labor agitators were converted and “born again” surely all problems would be solved--and it would be unnecessary to address the inequities that were actually behind angry strikers objecting to an unbridled, exploitive capitalism.

Horatio's lovely, blue-eyed wife Anna, the daughter of a Norwegian immigrant, was delighted to have moved into a better social class with her marriage to the handsome, prosperous attorney. Initially indifferent to religious pieties—as a young girl she had suffered a disturbing encounter with a supposedly “religious” man—events soon changed her mind. The devastating Chicago Fire of 1871 nearly ruined the Spaffords and flung Anna into a nervous depression which she could not shake. For the first time, she began listening seriously to the firey evangelist, Dwight Lyman Moody, whose powerful sermons were fueling the revivalist movement.

When Horatio promised her a salutary year in Europe, she did not know that he was borrowing heavily to fund such extravagances. Glad to leave Chicago, Anna and her four daughters boarded the luxury liner, Ville du Havre. Incredibly, on a beautiful starry night, the ship was rammed mid-Atlantic by an iron sailing vessel and sank in twelve minutes. All four children drowned; Anna alone was saved.

The tragedy stunned Horatio and Anna, and profoundly challenged their faith. Worse, in the heated religious atmosphere, fellow Chicagoans wondered what the Spaffords might have done for God to punish them so severely. Horatio abruptly abandoned the Presbyterian church on Fullerton Avenue in which he had been a pillar, and founded one of his own, offering some rather bizarre tenets.

With Anna's support, the couple soon gathered hundreds of devotees eager to believe their prophecy that the Second Coming was imminent. In 1881, events gathered into a “perfect storm” of trouble. Horatio's profligate financial dealings had come to light, and creditors and journalists were at their door. Anna received a timely "message from God" that they must sail immediately for Jerusalem. The Messiah, she announced, was about to alight on the Mount of Olives.

Accompanied by a handful of followers, the group departed Chicago to board a ship for the Holy Land. No sooner had they settled in Jerusalem than the U. S. Consul and the established Christian missionaries declared them heretics and whispered of scandal and sexual deviance. Yet Muslims and Jews admired their unflagging care of the sick and the needy, and Jews were intrigued with their advocacy of a Jewish Return to Zion according to the Biblical prophecies. When Horatio died, Anna assumed leadership, shocking even her adherents by abolishing marriage and established a dictatorship that was not always benevolent. Ever dogged by controversy yet praised and admired by many, she and her followers actively participated in the titanic upheavals that eventually formed the modern Middle East.

Thoroughly researched and a compelling read, American Priestess provides a fascinating exploration of the seductive power of evangelicalism and raises questions about the manipulation of religion to serve personal goals. A powerful narrative called by the Boston Globe “a triumph,” while the New York Times reviewer commented, “I'd love to buy the film rights,” the story of the Anna's colony sweeps through the dramatic collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the establishment of the British Mandate, and finally the founding of Israel where Anna’s house in East Jerusalem, now the American Colony Hotel, stands as an exemplar of neutrality as well as beauty and comfort, despite its turbulent history.