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News, events, updates, and tidbits from the Presbyterian Historical Society. Use tags to read related articles or sort by author for similar posts written by PHS staff members and volunteers.

New Frontiers in Mission & the Legacy of Margaret Flory

January 20, 2021

Margaret Flory was a pioneer in mission work for the Presbyterian Church. Throughout her long career with the Board of Foreign Missions, she created several cross-cultural ecumenical programs for youth, believing that that “the American church has much to learn from the rest of the world.” One of these programs, Junior Year Abroad, was one of the first study abroad programs in the country and allowed students to serve in places such as China, Brazil, India, Ghana, and the Philippines.

I recently processed Flory’s collection of personal papers as Record Group...

Author: 
Elizabeth Wittrig
Tags: 
Mission History, Womens History, Margaret Flory, Ecumenism, Archival Processing
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The Wilmore and McCloud Collections: Keeping the Common Memory Alive

February 19, 2020

Recently processed and now available for research at PHS are the personal papers of two prominent African American leaders in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.): Gayraud Wilmore and Oscar McCloud.

Rev. Wilmore’s papers were brought to the Society by his son Jack and daughter-in-law Carmen in July 2019. Rev. McCloud began donating his papers to the Society in 1999 and also deposited the last few boxes in July. Since then, I've had the privilege to prepare both collections for researchers.

...

Author: 
Elizabeth Wittrig
Tags: 
African American History, J. Oscar McCloud, Gayraud S. Wilmore, Archival Processing, Collections
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Progress Report: The Pam Byers Memorial Collecting Initiative

January 22, 2020

In September 2018, I was hired as the Pam Byers Memorial Fund Project Archivist to work full-time on collecting and making accessible the history of the movement for LGBTQIA+ inclusion in the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. Thanks to the generosity of donors and the willingness of Presbyterians to participate in this project, PHS has been able to add a substantial amount of material to our collections that document LGBTQIA+ history from the late 1960s until today. 

New...

Author: 
Elizabeth Wittrig
Tags: 
LGBTQIA+ History, Collections, Archival Processing
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"Is Anyone Else Out There Gay?"

June 17, 2019

At the 1974 General Assembly of the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., David Sindt stood on the Assembly floor holding a hand-written sign that read, “Is anyone else out there gay?”

David Sindt was born in 1940 and grew up attending Presbyterian churches in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He received his Masters of Divinity in 1966 from McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago and was ordained by the...

Author: 
Elizabeth Wittrig
Tags: 
LGBTQIA+ History, Congregations
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Processing the Voices of Sophia Records

April 7, 2019

“At a time where feminist values were disparaged, marginalized, and trivialized as ‘politically correct,’ Voices of Sophia called the PC(USA) to its historic commitments to women, to justice, and to reformation. It encouraged spiritual growth, renewal, and interpersonal connections around women’s theologies and justice issues.” –-Janet Lowery

In 1993, the feminist Re-Imagining Conference caused an uproar throughout the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). The PC(USA) had...

Author: 
Elizabeth Wittrig
Tags: 
Collections, Womens History, Archival Processing
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