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Wednesday, November 15, 2017

Calista Burke Downing

C. B. Downing was the first Watch Tower missionary in China. She began reading Zion's Watch Tower in 1882. She was originally a Presbyterian missionary and ran a girls' school in Cheffoo. She rescued girls sold into slavery, adopting them as her own. Herewith is a picture of rescued slave children.


4 comments:

roberto said...

Surely, apart of beeing a Watch Tower believer, she was a good woman.

Andrew Martin said...

Yes, Roberto, she seems to have been simply an incredible woman, in so many ways, including adopting daughters whom she raised in the Faith, in addition to having previously taught on Native American reservations, and attracting other missionaries in China to Bible teaching.

Glad that research on these topics has grown exponentially since the old days, when all we knew was what appeared on page 41 of the 1974 Yearbook, plus a letter from W. R. Fuller, dated March 2, 1891, printed in the appendix of "Thy Kingdom Come".

This ongoing research by Schulz and de Vienne has done so much to expand our knowledge of the history of this belief system - and we can only benefit by knowing the whole truth.

Unknown said...

Great woman. Slavery is pain of our time.

Jeff Altgilbers said...

Thank you for this post. I never knew this and I’ve been a collector of watchtower history for many years. Do you have a photo of the woman?