Will L. Thompson (1847–1909) was a highly successful American composer of gospel and secular music. Thompson was a man of deep humility, traveling by horse and buggy to small towns and country churches to sing his songs and share his faith. In 1880, he wrote the tender, beautiful invitation hymn 'Softly and Tenderly Jesus Is Calling'. When the famous evangelist Dwight L. Moody was dying in a hospital, Thompson came to visit him. Moody raised himself up and whispered: 'Will, I would rather have written "Softly and Tenderly" than anything I have done in my whole life'.