The accounts collected on June 5, 1909, during the centennial celebration of the death of Thomas Paine, depict him as a true visionary in many fields, which in many ways he was.  He wrote on the subject of slavery, arguing against it.  He was a philosopher and a free thinker; his paper The Age of Reason explained and argued in favor of deism.  He became an influential figure in the French Revolution, not just the American one, before his death in 1809, and his associated works from both (Rights of Man, Common Sense and The American Crisis) live on long after.  He is one of the greatest influences on early American thought and had an undeniable and nearly unmatched hand in the events of the American Revolution.  The Reverend Thomas R. Slicer, effusing praise, recounted in his speech that, "everything that has taken place as a result of organizing the United States of America was the result of Thomas Paine's labors."  Dr. Muzzey said that "to Paine the idea of loyalty without activity was unthinkable."  This idea that a nation's people need to play the most active of roles in its upkeep and in enacting their beliefs permeated the American identity and still serves as the backbone of its society in modern times.