As early as 1897, Quaker missionaries from the California Yearly Meeting, an independent programmed meeting of Friends, began work among the Eskimo people in Alaska. In 1970 the work had grown to the point that it was organized as a yearly meeting affiliated with the California Meeting, which maintained a Bible Training School. A goal of turning the work of the Meeting entirely over to its Eskimo constituency was accomplished in 1982 when the last of the missionaries were withdrawn and the Alaska Yearly Meeting became fully independent. The California Meeting has joined the Friends United Meeting.

Membership

In 1981 there were 11 congregations and 2,860 members.

Educational Facilities

Bible Training School.

Sources

Alaska Yearly Meeting. www.evangelicalfriends.org/north-america/regions/alaska/index.html

Central Yearly Meeting of Friends

Rte. 1, Box 226, Alexandria, IN 46001

The Central Yearly Meeting of Friends was formed in 1926 by several meetings in eastern Indiana who were protesting the liberalism of the Five Years Meeting. Doctrinally, the Central Yearly Meeting of Friends is evangelical and very conservative in matters of personal holiness. Worship is programmed. Churches of this small body are found in Indiana, North Carolina, Arkansas, and Ohio. Missionary work is sponsored in Bolivia.

Membership

In 2008 the Meeting reported nine affiliated monthly meetings (congregations).

Educational Facilities

Union Bible College, Westfield, Indiana.

Periodicals

Friends Evangel. Available from 5601 E Co. Rd. 6505, Muncie, IN 47302.

Sources

Central Yearly Meeting of Friends. www.centralyearlymeetingoffriends.org/.

Evangelical Friends Church–Eastern Region

5350 Broadmoor Cir. NW, Canton, OH 44709

Known before 1971 as the Ohio Yearly Meeting of Friends, the Evangelical Friends Church is that branch of the Friends most influenced by the Holiness movement. The Evangelical Friends have a programmed worship service with a minister who preaches. Formed in 1813, the Ohio Yearly Meeting of Friends supported the Gurneyites, followers of Joseph John Gurney (1788–1847), a promoter of beliefs in the final authority of the Bible, atonement, justification, and sanctification. After the Civil War the Ohio Yearly Meeting became open to the Holiness movement through the activities of workers such as David Updegraff, Dougan Clark, Walter Malone, and Emma Malone. The latter founded the Cleveland Bible Insititute (now Malone College) in 1892; it serves an interdenominational Holiness constituency.

The Evangelical Friends Church, never a member of the Five Years Meeting, has become a haven for conservative congregations who have withdrawn from the Friends United Meeting in the United States and Canada. Mission work is sustained in Taiwan and India. The church participates in the Evangelical Friends Alliance.

Membership

In 2007 there were 8,898 members, with 17,217 regular attendees in 92 churches.

Educational Facilities

Malone College, Canton, Ohio.

Periodicals

The Facing Bench.

Sources

Evangelical Friends Church, Eastern Region. www.efcer.org/.

DeVol, Charles E. Focus on Friends. Canton, OH: Missionary Board of the Evangelical Friends Church–Eastern Region, 1982.

Faith and Practice, the Book of Discipline. Canton, OH: Evangelical Friends Church–Eastern Region, 1981.

Williams, Walter. The Rich Heritage of Quakerism. Newberg, OR: Barclay Press, 2006.

Evangelical Friends International

5350 Broadmoor Cir. NW, Canton, OH 44709

The Evangelical Friends International came into being in 1990 when it superseded the former Evangelical Friends Alliance. The alliance had existed as an association of four autonomous Quaker groups: the Evangelical Friends Church–Eastern Region, the Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting of Friends, the Evangelical Friends Church–Mid-America Yearly Meeting, and the Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends. These groups represented the Friends movement’s most theologically conservative elements, which showed much influence from the holiness movement of the nineteenth century. The Evangelical Friends Alliance had been founded in 1965, but was restricted at the end of the 1980s in recognition of the fact that the four affiliated groups had come to exist as a single denomination. The members of Evangelical Friends International attribute their change to the general evangelical renewal within Christianity, the new scholarly recognition of the evangelical nature of early Quakerism, and the cooperative work of the Evangelical Friends Alliance.

The Evangelical Friends Church, Eastern Region, which existed for many years as the Ohio Yearly Meeting of Friends, was formed in 1813. As the work developed, members became attracted to the preaching of Joseph John Gurney (1788–1847), who had been deeply affected by Methodist holiness doctrines. Most active in promoting the holiness movement in Ohio were David Updegraff, Dougan Clark, Walter Malone, and Emma Malone. The Malones founded Cleveland Bible Institute (now Malone College) in 1892.

A generation after their movement into Ohio, Friends moved into Kansas and from there into Oklahoma, Texas, Nebraska, and Colorado. A Kansas Yearly Meeting (now the Evangelical Friends Church–Mid-America Yearly Meeting) was formed in 1872. It affiliated with the Five Years Meeting in 1900, but withdrew in 1937 as more conservative elements became dominant. The Kansas Meeting established a mission in the Congo (now Burundi) in 1934 and later founded Camp Quaker Haven at Arkansas, Kansas, for its youth.

The Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends Church dates to the movement of Friends into the Willamette Valley of Oregon in the late nineteenth century. The first settlers had been from Iowa and continued their affiliation with the Iowa Yearly Meeting, but by 1893 they had grown sufficiently for an independent Oregon Yearly Meeting to be set apart. As work expanded into Washington and Idaho, the present name was assumed. From 1902 to 1936 the Oregon Yearly Meeting was affiliated with the Five Years Meeting, but it subsequently withdrew because of the increasingly conservative theological stance of Friends in the Northwest.

The Northwest Meeting sponsors four campground facilities, Friendship Manor (a retirement home), Barclay Press (a printing company), George Fox University, and several elementary and high schools.

The Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting was established in 1957 from congregations formerly affiliated with the Nebraska Yearly Meeting. The Nebraska Meeting was affiliated with the Friends United Meeting, but the Rocky Mountain Meeting did not continue that relationship. The Rocky Mountain Meeting sponsors a campground near Woodland Park, Colorado.

In recent years, both the Evangelical Church–Southwest (formerly California Yearly Meeting) and Alaska Yearly Meeting have joined Evangelical Friends International.

Membership

In 2008 there were 300 congregations with 41,000 attendees in North America. Worldwide attendance is more than 140,000 in over 1,100 churches and there are mission ministries in 24 countries.

Educational Facilities

Malone College, Canton, Ohio.

Barclay College and Academy, Haviland, Kansas.

Friends University, Wichita, Kansas.

Houston Graduate School of Theology, Houston, Texas.

George Fox University, Newberg, Oregon.

Periodicals

The Friends Voice.

Sources

Evangelical Friends International. www.evangelicalfriends.org/.

Barrett, Paul W. Educating for Peace. Board of Publication, Kansas Yearly Meeting of Friends, n.d.

Choate, Ralph E. Dust of His Feet. Author, 1965.

DeVol, Charles E. Focus on Friends. Canton, OH: Missionary Board of the Evangelical Friends Church–Eastern Division, 1982.

Discipline. Kansas Yearly Meeting of Friends, 1966.

Faith and Practice of the Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting of Friends Church. Pueblo, CO: Riverside Printing Co., 1978.

Faith and Practice: The Book of Discipline. Canton, OH: Evangelical Friends Church–Eastern Division, 1981.

The Story of Friends in the Northwest. Newberg, OR: Barclay Press, n.d.

25th Anniversary Committee. Friends Ministering Together. Pueblo, CO: Riverside Printing Co., 1982.

Friends General Conference

1216 Arch St., 2B, Philadelphia, PA 19107

The Friends General Conference (FGC) is an association of otherwise autonomous yearly meetings in the United States and Canada, most of which emphasize the authority gained through the direct experience of God, are open to theological diversity and the enrichment it can bring, and follow an unprogrammed pattern of worship. The yearly meetings that make up the Conference incorporated three strands of American Quakerism: the “Hicksite” and “Progressive” movements of the nineteenth century, and the twentieth-century “independent meeting” movement.

At the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting in 1827 a crisis resulted in separations in most of the yearly meetings (regional associations) in North America. Those who followed Elias Hicks (1748–1830) did not necessarily share either his political views or his theology, but they insisted that ministers must be free to speak as led by God. The Hicksite yearly meetings that emerged from the split tended to be more rural, less wealthy, more “quietist” or “sheltered,” and more mystical than their orthodox counterparts.

Friends who shared Hicks’s radical social views were not always welcome in Hicksite meetings. Out of their common concern for abolition, women’s rights, and economic justice grew the “Progressive” Quaker movement, which flourished in the mid-nineteenth century and continued to hold annual meetings through the 1930s. The Progressive yearly meetings did not have formal membership. They were in effect a support group for activist Friends such as Lucretia Mott (1793–1880), who remained a member of the Hicksite meeting, as well as disowned Friends and non-Friends concerned about social injustice. The Progressive influence was a major, although largely hidden, source of energy in the founding of the Friends General Conference.

From the beginning, the Hicksite yearly meetings corresponded with each other about common concerns. In 1868 the inter-yearly meeting First Day School Association was established, followed by the Friends’Philanthropic Union in 1882. The regular biennial conferences of these groups wove the seven Hicksite meetings together. By the 1890s these two associations were holding combined conferences every other year. The Religious Conference was added in 1894, and the Education Conference in 1896. In 1900 the Friends General Conference was established on a permanent basis to support the work of these four groups, as well as the independent Young Friends Associations. Progressive Friends were prominent in the leadership of the Philanthropic Union, the Religious Conference, and Friends General Conference itself during its first few decades.

The third strand woven into the history of Friends General Conference was the independent meeting movement. The work of the American Friends Service Committee during and after World War I attracted many newcomers to Quakerism. Beginning in the 1920s new unprogrammed meetings sprang up, often in college towns and cities. These meetings were neither Hicksite nor orthodox. They tended to value individualism, social radicalism, open worship, and theological diversity. As these growing independent meetings organized into new yearly meetings and regional associations, most chose to affiliate with Friends General Conference. By the mid-1970s there were fourteen yearly meetings and associations affiliated with Friends General Conference.

Friends General Conference held conferences every other year until 1962, when off-year conferences were introduced. In 1968 the conferences became annual “gatherings” that emphasized fellowship and spiritual enrichment in place of business meetings. The ongoing work of the organization is overseen by a central committee of about 160 members appointed by the constituent yearly meetings, and an executive committee made up of committee clerks and yearly meeting representatives.

The program is carried out by eight standing committees: Advancement and Outreach, Christian and Interfaith Relations, Long-Range Conference Planning, Ministry and Nurture, Ministry on Racism, Publications and Distribution, Religious Education, Youth Ministries, and the Traveling Ministries Committee. The Friends Meeting House Fund, Inc., which holds funds for meetings in need of buying, building, or remodeling buildings, operates with a separate board of directors appointed by the central committee. The Friends Journal, an independent publication, is closely identified with FGC.

Included in the conference are the Baltimore, Canadian, Illinois, Lake Erie, New England, New York, Northern, Ohio Valley, Philadelphia, South Central, and Southeastern Yearly Meetings; the Southern Appalachian Yearly Meeting and Association; Piedmont Friends Fellowship (NC); Alaska Friends Conference; and ten monthly meetings.

Membership

In 2008 the conference reported approximately 33,000 affiliated Quakers in 770 meetings and worship groups. Of these members, 1,100 were in Canada.

Educational Facilities

Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

Haverford College, Haverford, Pennsylvania.

Guilford College, Greensboro, North Carolina.

Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana.

Earlham School of Religion, Richmond, Indiana.

George Fox University, Newberg, Oregon.

Periodicals

FGConnections • RESources.

Sources

Friends General Conference. www.fgcquaker.org/.

Bacon, Margaret Hope. Mothers of Feminism. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1986.

Boulding, Elsie. My Part in the Quaker Adventure. Philadelphia: Religious Education Committee, Friends General Conference, 1858.

Brinton, Howard H. Friends for 350 Years. Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill Publications, 2002.

Doherty, Robert W. The Hicksite Separation. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1967.

Jones, Rufus M. The Latter Periods of Quakerism. 2 vols. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1970.

Rushmore, Jane P. Testimonies and Practice of the Society of Friends. Philadelphia: Friends General Conference, 1945.

Friends United Meeting

101 Quaker Hill Dr., Richmond, IN 47374

The largest of all the North American Quaker bodies, the Five Years Meeting of Friends was formed in 1902 as a loose coordinating agency by 12 yearly meetings. With the addition of programs and agencies, a full denominational structure has developed. There are now 27 yearly meetings in what became in 1965 the Friends United Meeting.

The Friends United Meeting represents the continuation of the “orthodox” Friends who had survived the Hicksite (Friends General Conference) and Wilburite (Religious Society of Friends Conservative) schisms, but who had existed throughout the nineteenth century as independent, geographical yearly meetings. Most worship is programmed. Ecumenical efforts began in the 1880s and a series of conferences every five years led to the formation of the Five Years Meeting.

The statement of faith of the Meeting, based on the teachings of Jesus as “we understand them,” includes beliefs in true religion as a personal encounter with God rather than ritual and ceremony; in individual worth before God; worship as an act of seeking; the essential Christian virtues of moral purity, integrity, honesty, simplicity, and humility; Christian love and goodness; concern for the suffering and unfortunate; and continuing revelation through the Holy Spirit.

ORGANIZATION

The work of the meeting is carried out through its general board. The department of World Ministries oversees missions in Cuba, Jamaica, Belize, the West Bank in Israel, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and the United States. The department of Meeting Ministries serves the needs of the local congregations by promoting spiritual development, church planting, evangelism, and Christian education programs. Friends United Meeting also operates a retail bookstore and a book publishing enterprise called Friends United Press. Member Yearly Meetings are: Baltimore, Canada, Cuba, East Africa, East Africa (South), Elgon, Indiana, Jamaica, Iowa, Nairobi, Nebraska, New England, New York, North Carolina, Southwest, Southeastern, Western, Wilmington, Bwase, East Africa (North), Kaka Mega, Luggri, Malava, Nandi, Tanzania, Uganda, Vokoli, and Canadian Central. Friends United Meeting is a member of both the World Council of Churches and the National Council of Churches.

Membership

In 1996 the meeting had 46,789 members in the United States and 1,129 members in Canada, with an additional 100,000 members in Africa, Cuba, Jamaica, Mexico, and Israel.

Educational Facilities

Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana.

Earlham School of Religion, Richmond, Indiana.

Guilford College, Greensboro, North Carolina.

William Penn College, Oskaloosa, Iowa.

Friends Theological College, Tiriki, Kenya.

Periodicals

Quaker Life.

Sources

Friends United Meeting. www.fum.org/.

Hall, Francis B., ed. “Friends United Meeting.” In Friends in the Americas. Philadelphia: Friends World Committee, Section of the Americas, 1976.

Intermountain Yearly Meeting

Current address could not be obtained for this edition.

In the early 1970s, the Pacific Yearly Meeting devised a plan to divide its widely scattered membership into more geographically workable units. Members in Arizona and New Mexico joined with otherwise independent friends in Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado, as well as Colorado Friends who had withdrawn from the Missouri Valley Yearly Meeting, to form the Intermountain Yearly Meeting. The group had its first annual session in 1975. Most congregations are unprogrammed. The Mexico City congregation affiliated with the Pacific Yearly Meeting also participates in the Intermountain fellowship.

Membership

In 1991 the meeting reported 997 members in 17 monthly meetings and 18 worship groups.

Sources

Intermountain Yearly Meeting. www.imym.org/.

Iowa Yearly Meeting of Friends (Conservative)

PO Box 657, Oskaloosa, IA 52577

The Iowa Yearly Meeting of Friends was established in 1877 by Conservative Friends who separated from the Iowa Yearly Meeting, which is now a part of the Friends United Meeting established in 1863. It keeps unprogrammed meetings for worship and operates the Scattergood Friends School, a coeducational college-preparatory high school near West Branch, Iowa.

Membership

In 2001 there were 548 members in 11 monthly meetings.

Sources

Iowa Yearly Meeting of Friends. www.iaym.org/.

Hall, Francis B., ed. Friends in the Americas. Philadelphia, PA: Friends World Committee, 1976.

Missouri Valley Friends Conference

c/o Penn Valley Friends Meeting, 4405 Gillhan Rd., Kansas City, MO 64110

The Missouri Valley Friends Conference was formed in 1955 as an association of unprogrammed Quaker meetings in the Midwest that were not affiliated with any other established yearly meeting. The conference meets annually. Over the years some of the local groups have affiliated with the yearly meetings and discontinued participation in the conference. At the same time, new unaffiliated meetings have joined the conference, so attendance has remained fairly constant.

Membership

Not reported.

Sources

Penn Valley Friends Meeting.

www.quakernet.org/MonthlyMeetings/PennValley/report_mvfc04.html.

North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends (Conservative)

PO Box 4591, Greensboro, NC 27404

The North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends (Conservative) is the result of a separation among Friends in North Carolina at the beginning of the twentieth century. At that time, there was a move to form what would become the Five Years Meeting (now known as the Friends United Meeting). As part of these developments, a new book of discipline was adopted. The Cedar Grove Monthly Meeting opposed the new trends it saw emerging and placed special emphasis on the retention of the unprogrammed meetings for worship. In 1904 it formed a separate yearly meeting and over the years other monthly meetings have been added. They have found fellowship with the other conservative Friends in the Ohio and Iowa Yearly Meetings, and periodically gather with them for fellowship.

Conservative Friends, also called Wilburites, place special emphasis in their faith and practice on the direct, unmediated experience of the presence and guidance of God. Their worship consists of waiting silently for this presence to become manifest, and vocal ministry is limited to those words the speaker feels confident are inspired by God. Conservative Friends do not act on any matter until moved of God; once moved, however, they are not easily or soon dissuaded.

Membership

In 2008 the meeting reported eight affiliated monthly meetings (congregations).

Educational Facilities

Guilford College, Greensboro, North Carolina.

Sources

North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends. www.ncymc.org/.

North Pacific Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends

Friends Meeting House, 3311 NW Polk, Corvallis, OR 97330

In the early 1970s, the Pacific Yearly Meeting, which had congregations spread over a wide geographical range, divided into several yearly meetings. In 1972, members in Oregon and Washington became the North Pacific Yearly Meeting and held the first independent session in 1973. Since its formation, groups have been added in Idaho and Montana. The Meeting keeps close ties with the parent body with whom it jointly supports a periodical. The Meeting is governed in a non-hierarchical fashion. A steering committee provides continuity and a clerk convenes its gatherings, records its minutes, and represents the Meeting to others.

Membership

In 1997 the meeting reported 18 monthly meetings, four quarterly meetings, and 32 worship groups gathered in the quarterly meetings. There were approximately 761 members.

Periodicals

Friends Bulletin. Send orders to 5238 Andalusia Ct., Whittier, CA 90601.

Sources

North Pacific Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. www.npym.org/

Faith and Practice. Corvallis, OR: North Pacific Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, 1986.

Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends Church

200 N Meridian St., Newberg, OR 97132-2714

Quaker settlers in the Northwest first gathered in the fertile Willamette Valley in Oregon in the late nineteenth century. These early settlers were from Iowa and associated with the Iowa Yearly Meeting. In 1893 they were officially established as an independent yearly meeting by the Iowa Yearly Meeting, with the name Oregon Yearly Meeting of Friends. Because some churches were located in Washington and Idaho, the name was changed to Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends. From 1902 to 1936 the Oregon Yearly Meeting was a part of the Five Years Meeting, but has in more recent years affiliated with the Evangelical Friends International.

The doctrine of the Northwest Yearly Meeting (NWYM) is biblically based with a central message of the lordship of Jesus Christ. The emphasis of salvation through the Lord coupled with a strong sense of social commitment have been the two dominant themes of the meeting.

NWYM maintains a relationship with four camping facilities, Friendsview Manor (a retirement home), Barclay Press (a publishing company), George Fox University, and several elementary and high schools. Missionary work is carried out in cooperation with the Evangelical Friends International. A joint mission program is supported in Mexico, Rwanda, Burundi, Taiwan, Peru, and Bolivia.

Membership

In 2001 NWYM reported 7,017 members and 51 churches, including six extension churches. Ten mission points/church plants are under the care of the board of evangelism.

Educational Facilities

George Fox University, Newberg, Oregon.

Periodicals

The Friends Voice. Available from 2748 E Pikes Peak Ave., Colorado Springs, CO 80909.

Sources

Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends Church. www.nwfriends.org/.

This Story of the Friends in the Northwest. Newberg, OR: Barclay Press, n.d.

Ohio Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends, Conservative

c/o Dorothy Smith, Correspondent, 108 Fowler Ave., Barnesville, OH 43713-1176

The Ohio Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends was established in 1813 and originally included most of the Friends west of the Allegheny Mountains. It grew out of Philadelphia and other eastern yearly meetings that were begun during the first decades of the Friends movement, when followers believed themselves to be called by Christ to once again tear open the veil that Catholicism and other Protestant churches had erected between the laity and the deity. Soon after the Hicksites left the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting in 1827, a similar separation occurred in Ohio. The Conservative Yearly Meeting continued its unequivocal recognition of Christ Jesus as the Son of God, whose suffering on the cross they believe opened a path to salvation and eternal life for His Friends to follow.

Friends believe that the risen, living Christ is here among us, having come to teach His people Himself. It is He who leads their worship, as they meet to wait for His immediate direction, with no paid or “ordained” clergy to intervene. They hold that the Bible is inspired by God through His Holy Spirit to serve for edification and guidance, but only as we ourselves have their meaning opened to us by the same Holy Spirit. They believe that He calls us to perfection and that He perfects us to the extent that we submit, on our daily cross, to His work. They call themselves “Conservative” to distinguish themselves from others who trace their roots to Quakerism but are unsure whether they are Christians, or have paid clergy and worship planned by humans.

The beliefs of members of the Ohio Yearly Meeting are not a recitation of what their predecessors have taught them, but a statement of what they have experienced—Christ Jesus as their head, their teacher, their high priest, and their shepherd in all things. When they meet to worship, they wait quietly for Him to lead them, to comfort them, to supply whatever their need is at the time. When they meet to conduct the business of the Meeting, they do so prayerfully and in humility, each person seeking to surrender his or her own will and wisdom and to know the will and wisdom of God for His people. They obey the command of Jesus not to swear oaths but to be honest in all things. They do not make war on behalf of any worldly government. They recognize all races and both genders as created equal in God’s love. They extend God’s love to their enemies as well as their friends and families. They work to keep their minds and their bodies pure, as they believe that the body is God’s temple.

The yearly meeting, composed of representatives of the monthly meetings, provides general oversight of the society. Each monthly meeting appoints two men and two women to have responsibility for pastoral care of members and the nurturing of harmony within the body. Spiritual oversight of the meeting for worship and oversight of the ministry are under the care of the elders. Special gifts in verbal ministry are recorded. Nevertheless, all members of the body are responsible for serving and ministering as needs and callings arise. The meeting has affiliated work in eleven countries.

The yearly meeting is a member of the Friends World Committee for Consultation. Fellowship is kept with the other two remaining Conservative yearly meetings—North Carolina and Iowa—and there are periodic gatherings of members from the three groups. There is no direct missional program, but a number of service projects are supported through the American Friends Service Committee.

Membership

In 2007 the meeting reported 528 members in two yearly and 13 monthly meetings.

Periodicals

Ohio Conservative Friends Review. Send orders to Susan Smith, 3876 Hopkins Gap Rd., Harrisonburg, VA 22802.

Sources

Ohio Yearly Meeting of the Society of Friends. www.ohioyearlymeeting.org.

Pacific Yearly Meeting of Friends

Current address could not be obtained for this edition.

Quakers began to establish congregations on the West Coast in the 1880s. In 1931, with impetus from Howard H. Brinton (1888–1973) and Anna Brinton (1883–1969), a meeting was called that led to the formation of the loosely organized Pacific Coast Association of Friends. In 1947 the Pacific Yearly Meeting was established within the Association. Over the next decade, it grew to include 40 congregations as far apart as Mexico City, Honolulu, and Canada. As a result, a committee recommended a division of the meeting into three meetings. This led to the establishment of two new meetings, the North Pacific Yearly Meeting (1972) and the Intermountain Yearly Meeting (1973). Though each meeting is independent, there are close familial ties and they jointly publish a periodical.

The Pacific Yearly Meeting of Friends’worship is unprogrammed. Membership is concentrated in California, but includes congregations in Mexico City and Honolulu.

Membership

Not reported. In 1996 there were 48 congregations in California and Nevada.

Periodicals

Friends Bulletin. Available from Friends Bulletin Corporation, 5238 Andalucia Ct., Whittier, CA 90601-2222.

Sources

Pacific Yearly Meeting of Friends. www.pacificyearlymeeting.org/.

Brinton, Howard H. Guide to Quaker Practice. Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill Publications, 1955.

Faith and Practice. San Francisco: Pacific Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, 1973.

Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting

4575-B Eliot St., Denver, CO 80211

The Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting was established in 1957 when it separated from the Nebraska Yearly Meeting and did not continue the latter’s affiliation with the Friends United Meeting. Worship is programmed. Mission work is carried out by the Navajo Indians at the Rough Rock Friends Mission near Chinle, Arizona, and by other individuals through cooperation with the Evangelical Friends Mission. Quaker Ridge Camp is maintained north of Woodland Park, Colorado.

Membership

In 2008 the meeting reported 11 affiliated monthly meetings (congregations).

Educational Facilities

Barclay College, Haviland, Kansas.

Friends University, Wichita, Kansas.

George Fox College, Newberg, Oregon.

Periodicals

The Traveling Minute. • Friends Voice. Available from 600 E 3rd St., Newberg, OR 97132.

Sources

Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting. www.rmym.org/.

Faith and Practice of the Rocky Mountain Yearly Meeting of Friends Church. Pueblo, CO: Riverside Printing Co., 1978.

25th Anniversary Committee. Friends Ministering Together. Pueblo, CO: Riverside Printing Co., 1982.

Southeastern Yearly Meeting

PO Box 510795, Melbourne Beach, FL 32951-0795

Though formally incorporated only in 1964, Quakers in Florida have a much longer history. George Fox (1624–1691), commonly considered the founder of the Quakers, traveled past the Spanish-claimed Florida and Georgia coastlines. In 1696 the early Quaker Jonathan Dickinson (1663–1722), for whom the Florida state park is named, landed and wrote his famous journal. Nearly 75 years later, the Quaker botanist William Bartram (1739–1823) studied Florida flora. He wrote that in 1793 he visited a Friends meeting (church service) near Wrightsborough, Georgia, that had formed in about 1755. By 1807 these Friends, opposed to slavery, had migrated to Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.

Between 1800 and 1900 the first influx of Florida Friends arrived from Indiana, Nebraska, and Iowa into Alachua County. Whitewater Meeting (1884–1897) near Archer was under the care of Richmond (Indiana) Monthly Meeting, whose members built the first Florida meetinghouse. During the same period, Lake Kerr Friends who had migrated from Michigan, Ohio, and London started the first Friends elementary. They sent their high school youth to Westtown Friends School near Philadelphia. A freeze in 1892 to 1893 wiped out both of these Friends communities of orange grove owners.

Contemporary Quaker history commenced in 1893 when the railroad transported the first Quaker farmers to Miami from the northeast. The Quaker community became firmly established there in 1948 and, under the care of Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC), became a monthly meeting in 1950. In 1944 Friends who had moved to Orlando from New Jersey and Philadelphia became a monthly meeting in 1944 under the care of FWCC. In 1917 St. Petersburg Friends organized; they too became a recognized monthly meeting under the care of FWCC, and built Florida’s first continuously used meetinghouse. Due to very poor roads and no direct transportation, there was little contact among these early Florida Friends.

By 1950, encouraged by the American Friends Service Committee (winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1947), the Southeastern Conference of the Religious Society of Friends was formed. During the 1962 conference it was decided that “Seven Meetings of the Southeastern Friends Conference having indicated by official Minutes their desire to assume Yearly Meeting status, the Planning Committee recommends that these Meetings now consider themselves the Southeastern Yearly Meeting [of the Religious Society] of Friends.” … These seven monthly meetings were Augusta, Georgia, and in Florida, Gainesville, Jacksonville, Miami, Orlando, Palm Beach, and St. Petersburg.

The first full yearly meeting was held April 12, 1963, near Avon Park, Florida. J. Barnard Walton (Friends General Conference, 1915–1963) had been instrumental in shepherding the conference from its inception in 1950 to this conclusion, and in his honor the yearly business meeting Saturday-night lecture series was named the Walton Lecture. In addition to the larger annual business meeting, two annual interim business meetings and four executive committee meetings are held. The Michener Lecture takes place on the Sunday immediately following the winter interim business meeting. SEYM incorporated in 1964.

SEYM meetings continue to grow and wane as population centers evolve. In 2008 25 meetings were affiliated with or had a relationship with SEYM: Charleston Monthly Meeting, Clearwater Monthly Meeting, Crestview Worship Group, Deland Preparative Meeting, Fort Lauderdale Monthly Meeting, Fort Myers Monthly Meeting, Gainesville Monthly Meeting, Golden Isle Worship Group, Halifax Meeting, Jacksonville Monthly Meeting, Key West Worship Group, Lake Wales Worship Group, Managua Worship Group, Miami Monthly Meeting, Ocala Meeting, Orlando Monthly Meeting, Palm Beach Monthly Meeting, Sarasota Monthly Meeting, Savannah Meeting, Space Coast Monthly Meeting, St. Petersburg Monthly Meeting, Treasurer Coast Worship Group, Tallahassee Monthly Meeting, Tampa Monthly Meeting, and Winter Park Monthly Meeting.

SEYM is noted for its social concerns, including assisting in the founding and support of ProNica, an international Quaker organization that aids the people of Nicaragua.

Friends’s testimonies continue to be: simplicity, peace, integrity and truth, community and equality, and caring for earth and our environment.

Membership

Not reported.

Periodicals

SEYM Newsletter. • Dwight and Ardis Michener Memorial Lectures and J. Barnard Walton Lectures.

Sources

Southeastern Yearly Meeting. www.seym.org/.

Friends General Conference. “New to Quakerism?” www.fgcquaker.org/ao/newquakerism.

Southeastern Yearly Meeting. Faith and Practice. Melbourne Beach, FL: Author, 2002.

Southern Appalachian Yearly Meeting and Association

c/o L. Perch, 330 Goebel Ave., Savannah, GA 31404

The Southern Appalachian Yearly Meeting and Association of Friends was formed in 1970 at Crossville, Tennessee. It was established by congregations in Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky, West Virginia, South Carolina, and North Carolina, some of which had been associated together as early as 1940 in the South Central Friends Conference (and later in the Southern Appalachian Association of Friends). Congregations are unprogrammed and there are no paid ministers. Annual meetings, held in May, center on silent worship, a search together on a chosen theme, and social concerns. After existing for some years as an independent meeting, the Southern Appalachian Association recently became a constituent part of the Friends General Conference.