William Jennings Bryan's Cross Of Gold Speech

William Jennings Bryan was a great man that was a well know figure in the in the Gilded Age Era. Not much can be told about his ancestor’s roots because it’s believed that His ancestors have lived in America so long that nobody is really sure where they are from. Even though historians aren’t sure of where his family is from they are believed to be some kind of English descent. William Jennings Bryan was born March 19th, 1860 In Salem, Illinois, into a family with eight other siblings. Even though he was born into a family with eight other brothers and sisters all of them didn’t survive. Three of the siblings (Virginia, John and Hiram) died while they were still infants and William’s brother Russell Jones died at the age of seventeen the night before he was going to be sent off to college. . Growing up William attended both the …show more content…
William was a well rounded person but one of his speeches that he is most known for is his “Cross of Gold” speech. The main focus of this speech was the push for the United States to return back to the single metallic financial standard; silver more preferable over gold. Williams preferred silver over gold because a silver standard would have accommodated for the lower class of people or people that were already in debt. The silver standard would have also benefited manufactures whose products would have been cheaper and would have applied to a mass audience including foreign customers. Even though Williams delivered a remarkable speech the Republican candidate he was running against (William McKinely) beat him in the presidential race and won presidency and proceeded to adopt the gold standard Williams later died on July 26th, 1925 in Dayton, Tennessee to