"MacCracken Had Something Still Bigger in Mind"

"In a sense it was the vehicle of our validation, and people took it very, very seriously. Newspaper publishers used their editorial pages to lobby for or against nominees, and groups like the American Bar Association and the United Daughters of the Confederacy waged extensive, expensive campaigns to get 'their' candidates elected. Installation ceremonies were elaborate events. For a while the term 'Hall of Famer' carried greater cachet than 'Nobel laureate,' and a hilltop in the Bronx seemed, to many, the highest spot in the country, if not the world."

Richard Rubin in a 1997 Atlantic article tells the story of the Hall of Fame of Great Americans.