Mission Leader Within Segregated Methodism Born in North Carolina, Lillian Warrick Pope grew up in Philadelphia, where she was a social worker in the Zoar Methodist Church. A graduate of the Bible Institute of Pennsylvania and Temple University School of Theology in Philadelphia, she was ordained a local deacon in 1939 by Bishop Ernest G....
Educational Missionary in Liberia and Beyond Vivienne Newton Gray has been a public school teacher, religious social worker, Field Secretary with the Woman’s Division (1945-48), educational missionary in Liberia, West Africa (1948-74), and director of admissions and director of alumni affairs, Wiley College, Marshall, Texas. Working as a religious social worker with migrant families, Vivienne...
Leader in Mission, Integration Growing up in a Methodist parsonage laid the groundwork for Nettie Alice Green’s keen interest in mission. She was a charter member of the Woman’s Society of Christian Service in the Scott Methodist Church of Detroit, held offices in the Lexington Conference, and was Secretary of Student Work (1960-1964) and of...
Cuban Methodist leader in education, women’s work, and mission Luisa Garcia Acosta (Gonzalez) devoted her life to education. A graduate in teacher education of Colegio Buenavista, a Methodist school in Havana, Cuba, and of Havana University, with a doctor of education degree, she became principal of Phillips School and led that institution in its growth...
Leader Against Racial Discrimination Ernestine Henderson McKinney of Little Rock, Arkansas, was in decision-making, leadership positions before, during, and after the history-making unions of the branches of this church that now make up United Methodism. She worked for human rights and against racial discrimination when it was not popular to do so, receiving threatening calls...
Leader in and Student of Mission Following graduation from Dillard University in New Orleans, Emma Wilson Strother went to work with her mother, Clara J. Wilson, who was one of the superintendents of the National Friendship Home in Cincinnati. Emma later became superintendent of the Mother’s Memorial Center (now Wesley Child Care Center), which was...
Missionary, Mission Board Staff, and Mission Advocate From her early years of growing up in a parsonage to her years as a professional person, and later a lay woman active in church affairs, Kathryne Bieri Sears was devoted to mission. At age twenty-four, she was the first single woman appointed by the Methodist Episcopal Board...
Pioneer Missionary in Nigeria For forty years, Aletha Knapp Faust served as a pioneer missionary in Nigeria, Africa, spanning the years 1930 to 1970. Born in Holton, Kansas, she graduated from North Central College, Naperville, Illinois, and earned a master’s degree at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut. During their first eighteen years with the Pero tribe...
Mama Yema in the Congo Growing up in Harrison, Arkansas, Edith wanted to become a missionary and serve in Africa. After graduation from Peabody and Scarritt Colleges in Nashville, Tennessee, she was commissioned in 1931, and spent the next thirty-six years in Zaire (Congo) involved in Christian education, women’s work, social evangelism, directing schools and...
Michigan Advocate for Human Rights Louise Donaldson is remembered for her involvement in human rights issues. In Dearborn, Michigan, she founded a local Council on Human Rights, and was instrumental in the desegregation of every restaurant in her community. She worked with the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom to register black voters in...
