Tuesday, December 29, 2015
Richards again ...
We need to know if he shows up in The Watch Tower in the 1920s and 1930s. Anyone help?
Monday, December 28, 2015
We need to confirm birth data for this man
William E. Richards
W. E.
Richards was born in Illinois in May 1861 and joined the Methodist Episcopal Church
as a youth. By the time he appears on the pages of Zion’s Watch Tower,
he lived in Ohio with his wife and children. Writing to Russell in February
1892, he recalled his youthful interest in the Bible and his desire to preach: “From
a child I have read the Scriptures, and all other books that I thought or hoped
would make plain to my understanding the truth, as I was hungry to know and
anxious to teach it.”[1] By
the mid-1880s he was “
Sunday, December 27, 2015
Saturday, December 26, 2015
Another early worker
The Lady Canvasser
A
notice appeared in the Monongahela, Pennsylvania, Daily Republican of May 7,
1887, saying that, “The lady canvasser of the book ‘Millennial Dawn,’ wishes to
announce to the subscribers that the book will not be delivered until the 20th
of the month of May, or a little later, as the first edition of the book has
been entirely exhausted. About the 20th, she will be in the city to deliver the
books.” We do not know who this was. In the November 1883, Watch Tower,
Russell named “sisters” Raynor and Vogel as exemplary colporteurs. Vogel’s
first name appears to be Catherine. She continued in the work into the 1890s,
working with a Helena Boehmer in eastern Pennsylvania.[1]
Laura J. Raynor (1839-1917) was Maria Russell’s older sister and a widow. (Henry
Raynor, her husband, died in 1873.) Her active ‘ministry’ seems to have been
short-lived, and when Maria Russell left her husband Laura left the Watch Tower.
There
were other women evangelists. One such was Millia La Clare, a resident of
Kansas. Despite his illness, she and her husband packed their two boys, aged
seven and eleven, into a covered wagon “to save expenses” and canvassed the
prairie. Her brief biography, written as a letter to The St. Paul,
Minnesota, Enterprise tells the story:
Bro. Marting
Minor progress on this man:
Fred W. Marting (b. 1853) received a copy of Food
for Thinking Christians in the fall of 1881 and began circulating it
immediately. “It was food for me,” he wrote. “I scattered it ever since.” Later
in life he lived in Pittsboro, Indiana, and then Chicago, Illinois.[1]
Friday, December 25, 2015
Phillips and Bowman from earlier post
Captain John Riley Phillips, born
August 24, 1839, near Meadowville, son of James and Osa (Johnson)
Phillips, grandson of Jacob Phillips, great grandson of Isaac, and
great-great-grandson of Moses Phillips, an Englishman who settled on the
South Branch, and subsequently in Randolph County. Isaac Phillips
married Miss Kittle, of Randolph, and Jacob married Sarah Bennett. Osa
Johnson was a daughter of John Johnson and granddaughter of Robert
Johnson, a Scotchman. The subject of this sketch had one sister, Sarah
Ann, and no brother. His parents were very poor, possessed but little
education, married young and settled first in the eastern part of
Barbour, then a wild region. Subsequently they moved to Clover Creek,
which was still wilder, and again they moved, this time to Brushy Fork
in Barbour, where they made a permanent home. John Riley Phillips was a
man of unusually brilliant mind. Had he been educated he would probably
have gained a national reputation as a thinker and lecturer. He was an
orator of unusual ability, and a careful reader of such books as came
within his reach. His education was limited to the schools of the
neighborhood. Among his teachers was William Furguson who made a deep
impression upon the young man's mind. A literary society in that
neighborhood, attended by Captain Phillips, Captain A. C. Bowman and
others, was an association for good, and in point of intellectual
strength its equal could be found in few rural districts anywhere.
Not Satisfactory ...
Here's an excerpt from a new chapter. This is not making me happy. Not at all. We need to identify these people. If you want to help, this is a good way. Put first names to the last names in this section .... This is rough draft.
New Workers
It is
impossible to name everyone who showed interest or who became an adherent.
There are, however, interesting comments that lead us to some sound
conclusions. Many of the names we run across are those of Age-to-Come/One Faith
believers. Russell said some of his readers had been Second Adventists. Edward
Payson Woodward, whom we met in Nelson Barbour: The Millennium’s Forgotten
Prophet as chairman of the Worchester Conference and found in sympathy with
Barbour, wrote that several of his “personal friends … accepted Mr. Russell as
their Leader and spiritual Guide.” He too read Millennial Dawn (later Studies
in the Scriptures), but rejected it.[1]
Many more came from mainline Churches. New workers entered the field almost
with the first issue of Zion’s Watch Tower, but we are left with scant
documentation. Despite our best and persistent efforts we cannot identify most
of them.
“Brother and Sister McCormack”
Apparently
well-known to Watch Tower readers, the McCormacks are mentioned once. In
July 1882, Russell noted that they were moving to Chicago:
The
Chicago friends will be glad to know that Bro. McCormack is about to remove
there. Chicago is a good field, and our Brother and his wife remove there in
the hope of being used by the Master for the blessing of the household of
faith, by disseminating the truth. When he calls on you, receive him well –he
is a brother in Christ. Let meetings be commenced at once, and the Lord bless
you.[2]
Though
we lose sight of the McCormacks afterward, we don’t lose sight of the work in
Chicago. Street witnessing with Food for Thinking Christians produced
fruitage. Someone wrote to Russell in 1884 expressing his gratitude for the
booklet. He believed it reformed him:
Having picked up one of your little books on the street,
called “Food for Thinking Christians,” and “Why Evil was Permitted,” I became
deeply interested in it. It seems very good for thinking sinners as well as
Christians. I am a reformed man now, having been down in the gutter many a time
through intoxicating drink, though I have not tasted any now for over a year,
may God help me to keep from it. Having just read the little book, I see that
you will send others, and by so doing you will oblige me. I would like to lead
a better life, and become a Christian. I cannot see fully into the reality of
religion, but may the Lord open my heart and eyes to the great love he has for
them that fear him. I will try to make good use of anything you send.[3]
A few
months previously, Russell printed a letter from a newly interested person who
reported that he and his wife were dissatisfied with denominational teachings.
They wanted to circulate tracts:
You will permit me, though a stranger, to say that I
have received knowledge for both head and heart that years of searching had
failed to accomplish, and so with the hope of seeing others freed from
sectarian darkness, I, too, will be glad to be counted among those who are
helping to distribute the meat in due season. I know whom I trust now, thanks
be to God. The “Food”, came just when I had lost hold, because there was
nothing to hold me in the churches – for I searched Baptist, Methodist, Free
Methodist, Congregational and Presbyterian denominations till I became
satisfied that the Lord had something better for me to find: Then “Food” came –
it seemed accidentally – but now I see it was providentially. Let me heartily
thank you – or rather thank God for giving you the ability to open the way to
the light. Great is the surrounding darkness and we are desirous to have others
see their way clearly. If you can send us some reading matter, we can drop it
into good soil. A dear old child of God left our house in great sorrow and
perplexity of mind last Sunday evening. He has been a deacon in the Baptist
church for thirty years. Said he, “O, I have studied these matters until I just
find, that the more I give my mind to these things the less I know; and now I
just know nothing and have made up my mind to let it go, for God will bring it
out all right; and what can I do but wait Gods own good time. When we get over
there, we will see face to face.” I endeavored to persuade him to expect the
mystery to be explained. Said he: “O bring me anything. I want the best the
Lord gives. I know God is love and I hate this “Hell doctrine!” The minister in
a little church here is in a quandary: he is a thinking man, only he is in the
“iron bedstead.” Please send reading matter, if possible, – these two at least
feel their need.[4]
An
unnamed but persistent worker sent a brief note in April 1886, enclosing a
subscription payment. The note makes it clear that he had been working in the
poorer neighborhoods: “It is encouraging to know that among the lowly houses
there are ears to hear.” When printing the note, Russell omitted the signature.[5]
The Lady Canvasser
A
notice appeared in the Monongahela, Pennsylvania, Daily Republican of May 7,
1887, saying that, “The lady canvasser of the book ‘Millennial Dawn,’ wishes to
announce to the subscribers that the book will not be delivered until the 20th
of the month of May, or a little later, as the first edition of the book has
been entirely exhausted. About the 20th, she will be in the city to deliver the
books.” We do not know who this was. In the November 1883, Watch Tower,
Russell named “sisters” Raynor and Vogel as exemplary colporteurs. Vogel’s
first name appears to be Catherine. She continued in the work into the 1890s,
working with a Helena Boehmer in eastern
Pennsylvania.[6] Laura J. Raynor
(1839-1917) was Maria Russell’s older sister and a widow. (Henry Raynor, her
husband, died in 1873.) Her active ‘ministry’ seems to have been short-lived.
Others
Also active in late 1883 were
“Brothers” Van der Ahe, Cain, Grable, and Hughes. We know almost nothing about
them, not even their first names. In 1887, Russell mentions “Brothers” Marting,
van Hook, Gillis, Myers, Bryan, Cobb,
Blundin, Hickey, and Bowman.
Blundin and Hickey we profile in more appropriate
places. M. C. Van Hook was active in the American Midwest. He filled in for
Josephus Perry Martin while Martin preached near Miamisburg, Ohio. He was still
active in 1892, working with Samuel Leigh and William H. Deming in southern Ohio
and northern Kentucky. Russell described them as “earnest and faithful and are
blessed and a blessing wherever they go.”[7] He
was working in Indiana in 1894. We lose sight of him afterward. And we do not
know his full name.[8]
Myers is an unknown. Several Myers appear in latter
issues of the Watch Tower. None of them seem to have been active in this
period. Marting and Cobb are also unknowns. There are two possibilities for
“Brother Cobb.” A poem by N. B. Cobb appeared in the June 1881, Watch Tower,
and a brief note praising The Plan of the Ages was signed by a J. Cobb.
It appears in the October 1886 issue.[9] We
have but on sample of Cobb’s work, preserved in a letter to Russell printed in
the June 1888 Tower. Sent from D. M. Lee, a Baptist minister in Reynolds
County, Missouri, it records Cobb’s work with sample issues of Zion’s Watch
Tower:
Please
indulge me, a little. I had a copy of “zion's
watch tower” (Oct. 1886) handed me the other day by Mr. Cobb. I am
wonderfully well pleased with it. It has brought certain strange things to my
eyes, that I have been for years desiring to look into. I have toiled many long
years as a minister under the Baptist banner. The more I study the Scriptures,
and the better I understand Baptist Theology and discipline, the less I esteem
them.
For
years I have fought the palpable, absurd and inconsistent doctrine of eternal
punishment. I am now 71 years old and unable to work; but thank God, I can talk
yet, if I can't work; and when I speak, I wish to speak the truth; but feel
confident I cannot do it under my confused conditions. I need a kind hand to
lead me out. If you please send me the tower,
I will use it to the best of my ability, and will undertake to pay you for it
during the year.[10]
We have three possible identities for Bowman. Adam C.
Bowman, once a captain in the 19th Virginia Cavalry and a lawyer,
circulated The Plan of the Ages, but his activity seems to have been
mostly limited to Barbour County, West Virginia. He handed a copy to J. R.
Phillips, a Confederate veteran.[11]
Phillips took up the message, writing to Russell in 1887:
I
have talked much about the millennial
dawn with persons of intelligence, since I began its reading. Some
priest-ridden persons reject it, but I find its ideas a joy to many. I traveled
for fifteen miles across my county, a few days since, with a gentleman, and
shortly after joining him I remarked, I have been lately reading the millennial dawn, the most wonderful book
of our day. I gave him its outline and he eagerly continued the conversation
through our three hours ride. The next day I luckily had another friend to make
a part of the return ride with. I mentioned the book as before, and the gentleman
soon became interested, and we discussed it up to our parting. He then invited
me to go to his community and lecture upon the subject, which I promised to do,
when I thoroughly investigated the whole subject. I thank you a thousand times
for having placed this book in my hands and will be glad to have the second
volume on any terms.[12]
Phillips remained interested at
least to 1891. After reading Millennial Dawn – Volume 2, he wrote to
Russell expressing his gratitude. He was wounded in the Battle of the
Wilderness and crippled for life, he said. “I returned to my home that had been
ruined, at the close of the war, and found myself a cripple for life with a
life-struggle before me. I felt that my lot was a hard one, but I determined to
honor God and keep up a resolute will. Sometimes dark and threatening clouds
gathered about me, almost despair settled over my mind and fears almost
paralyzed my hopes for the future.” Reading The Plan of the Ages changed
that. “I read it, and poverty vanished into the marvelous light of a bright and
glorious hope,” he wrote. After reading both volumes he believed he could read
his Bible with understanding. He wanted to visit Russell during on of the Passover
conventions to shake his hand and thank him.[13]
Another possibility is a J. T.
Bowman who held meetings in Joplin, Missouri. He comes into the record too late
to be the “Brother Bowman” active in 1886. The most probable of the Bowmans is
Payton Green Bowman [continues]
[1] E. P. Woodward: Later-Day Delusions, No. 7: Another
Gospel; An Exposure of the System Known as Russellism, Safeguard and Armory,
July 1914, page 2.
[3] Interesting Letters, Zion’s Watch Tower, March
1884, page 1.
[4] Extracts from Interesting Letters, Zion’s Watch
Tower, November 1883, page 2.
[5] Extracts from Interesting Letters, Zion’s Watch
Tower, April 1886, page 2. [Not in reprints.]
[6] C. T. Russell: Harvest Laborers: Pray for Them, Zion’s
Watch Tower¸ September 15, 1892, page 50.
[7] For Deming see volume 1, page 52. We profile Blundin in
chapter – . Quotation is from ZWT of February 15, 1892,
page 50.
[8] Voice of the Church, Zion’s Watch Tower EXTRA,
June 11, 1894, page 190. [Not in reprints.]
[9] On page 8 of that issue. [Not in reprints.]
[10] Extracts from Interesting Letters, Zion’s Watch Tower,
June 1888, page 2.
[11] There are three J. R. Philips listed among Virginia
veterans. Two were privates in Cavalry units. One was a Captain serving in the 31st
Virginia Volunteers. Captain John R. Phillips fits the biographical details
found in Zion’s Watch Tower. (See J. D. Cook: A History of the
Thirty-First Virginia Regiment of Volunteers, C. S. A., Masters Thesis,
West Virginia University, 1955, pages 7-8.
[12] More Good News, Zion’s Watch Tower, October 1887,
page 8. [Not in reprints.]
[13] Extracts from Interesting Letters, Zion’s Watch Tower,
February 1891, page 30.
We think ...
After talking it out with Mr. Schulz, we think the lawyer mentioned in a previous post was Adam C. Bowman of West Virginia, a lawyer in coal country and a Watch Tower adherent in the correct period. There is no firm proof. It's only a surmise. We would like to locate his photo.
Laura J. Raynor
From the Pittsburgh Press in 1917.
Maria’s older sister was a keen supporter of ZWT theology
for a number of years, although you would not know it from her obituary.
A recent post on this blog has a Sister Raynor sharing in
colporteur work in 1887. Laura had been widowed some years before in 1873.
Harry Raynor had been under 40 years old at the time, leaving her with three
children, Howard M Raynor (c.1867-1946), Selina Raynor, who never married (c.1865-1948),
and Maria Raynor (c.1873-after 1941). Maria Raynor married S Frank McKee and
she is named as May Raynor McKee on his death certificate in 1941. The whole
family and offshoots stayed in the general Pittsburgh area.
At the time of her being mentioned in 1887, Laura’s children
would have been of an age to be mainly independent; Selina would have been
around 21, Howard around 20, and Maria (May) around 14. They were also all
listed as living in the same home as Laura’s mother, Selina Ackley, in the 1880
census.
Laura is mentioned several times in subsequent issues of
ZWT. In the May 1, 1892 issue, there was a meeting at her home. In the 1894
troubles, she signed a document with her sister Maria and others supporting
CTR. In the 1897 troubles between CTR and Maria, she supported Maria.
Thursday, December 24, 2015
Comments ...
Comments make me happy. They also provide me with feed back. Comments on content work best, even a 'well done.' Grammar we fix later.
A brief change...
...from all this serious research...
A sad tale noted in the Bible Students' newspaper, the St Paul Enterprise, involving Miracle Wheat, a monogrammed car, and the locals diversifying from cattle rustling and horse stealing.
Alas, I do not know whether he ever got his car back.
A sad tale noted in the Bible Students' newspaper, the St Paul Enterprise, involving Miracle Wheat, a monogrammed car, and the locals diversifying from cattle rustling and horse stealing.
Wednesday, December 23, 2015
Another ....
"Brothers Van der Ahe, Cain, Grable, Hughes, and Sisters Raynor and Vogel and others are doing remarkably well, and we trust that before next month many others will be doing as much or more."
Who ARE these people?
Update: Laura J. Raynor, Maria Russell's older sister. Sister Vogel is probably Catherine Vogel, a widow from Pittsburgh. We still have no ID for the rest.
Who ARE these people?
Update: Laura J. Raynor, Maria Russell's older sister. Sister Vogel is probably Catherine Vogel, a widow from Pittsburgh. We still have no ID for the rest.
Lawyer visiting Chicago
A lawyer's letter appears in the November 1885 Watch Tower. He tells of his ministry while in Chicago to try a case. There is no name. Can we identify him? Anyone?
Update: His last name may have been "Brown."
Update: His last name may have been "Brown."
McCormack
We need to identify the person named in this brief statement found in Zion's Watch Tower:
The Chicago friends will be glad to know that Bro.
McCormack is about to remove there. Chicago is a good field, and our Brother
and his wife remove there in the hope of being used by the Master for the blessing
of the household of faith, by disseminating the truth. When he calls on you,
receive him well--he is a brother in Christ. Let meetings be commenced at once,
and the Lord bless you. [view from the tower, July 1882, page 1.]
British Newspaper Archive
Do any of you have a subscription to http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk ? If so, will you search it for us?
H. L. Gillis
H. L. Gillis of West Virginia started associating in 1885. We need a full biography. Can you help?
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
More from "Out of Babylon" - Unedited and raw
Dissension
was not uncommon. It arose on several grounds. Those with similar, but ultimately
opposition views attended Watch Tower meetings. Some swayed by Barbour continued
to attend Watch Tower meetings because there was nowhere else to go. Paton’s
adherents were increasingly small in number, often having no meetings of their
own. They attended Watch Tower meetings, using them to spread Paton’s universalist
ideas. We discuss it more fully elsewhere, but we note here that beginning at
least in 1882, Paton prepared booklets and tracts that went out primarily to
Watch Tower readers. The earliest of these known to us was a thirty-two page
booklet reprinting chapter four and part of chapter five of the ‘revised’
edition of Day Dawn.[1] As
long as the meetings included those with opposition beliefs, opposition
literature made its way into the fellowship and colored group discussions.
Most examples come from a somewhat
later period but seem to accurately represent the problem. In Brockport, New
York, someone donated a subscription to Paton’s World’s Hope and Russell’s Watch
Tower to the Free Library.[2] A
letter written to J. H. Paton in 1902, illustrates the situation: “Sister V. …
asked me to subscribe for the Hope;
and I … have never been sorry. … It has been a blessing to me and much company
when alone. Z. W. T.; the Hope,
and my Bible are about all I read.”[3]
Benjamin Ford Weatherwax, a retired
Methodist clergyman living in Courtland, New York took up the Watch Tower message in 1901, possibly from earlier preaching by
S. O. Blunden, who preached there in 1893.[4]
Weatherwax wrote to Russell expressing his faith. A follow up letter was
printed in the January 1, 1902, Watch Tower. It told
the story of his withdrawal from the Methodist Church:
I
have had a big fight and gained a glorious victory. I send you my article
prepared for the Conference. I had a hard time to get a hearing, as my name was
called before I reached the seat of Conference. Had I been there then I could
have had the floor; but after that it was difficult. After pressing the matter
they allowed me five minutes to speak and I read rapidly until I reached the
sentence, “Thy Kingdom come,” two thirds through, and there the Bishop called
me to order. He said I had used up six minutes and I asked for an extension of
time but could not get it. (They had enough.) So I asked our own City Editor if
he would like to publish it and he consented.
There
was a great surprise I assure you, at Syracuse Conference, when I withdrew from
it and gave my reasons even partially. I commenced giving out tracts-- until
all were gone. When I gave one I said, “Read that carefully, when you are all
alone.” I have a good many old friends in the Conference and Church (Nominal),
but thanks be to God, I am the Lord's free man. Some have asked me what church
I am going to unite with, and my answer is the “Church of the first born, whose
names are written in heaven.”[5]
Benjamin
Ford Weatherwax (June 15, 1836 – November 8, 1903) attended Fairfield Seminary,
and later Hartwick Academy. Though he farmed for a while, he “he felt a strong
call to preach the gospel.” He was admitted to the ministry of the Methodist
Episcopal Church becoming an itinerant preacher in New York. He retired in 1885, and returned to farming. He gave
up farming in 1892, moving to Courtland, New York.[6] He
was convinced by Watch Tower doctrine about 1900 and preached it. He convinced six
others, and they formed the Church of the Little Flock in Courtland. By 1903, The
Syracuse, New York, Post-Standard gave it a
membership of “about ten.”[7]
Shortly after he resigned from the Methodist ministry, the editor of The
Courtland, New
York,
Evening Standard published his
statement of faith:
Courtland,
N. Y., October 29, [1901]
To the Editor of The Standard:
Sir – I have been asked to give a reason for the hope
that is within the church of the “Little Flock.” First, our organization is of
a heavenly origin rather than earthly. We belong to the “Church of the first
born whose names are written in heaven.” Our people are scattered all over the
earth. They are known by their Lord. …They are held together by love divine … .
They are one body and one spirit … .
We hold that the church which God is electing or
selecting during this gospel age is promised a spiritual or heavenly reward to
be “made partakers of the divine nature,” and to share with Christ the work of
blessing the world during the millennium. We understand that the millennial age
is for the very purpose of causing “the knowledge of the Lord to fill the whole
earth as the waters cover the sea,” and see “the true light which lighteth
[sic] every man that cometh into the world,” giving all a full opportunity to
come in to [sic] harmony with God.
We understand that the Bible teaches both the doctrine
of election and the doctrine of free grace – the election of this church during
this age and free grace for the world in general in the millennial age and in
perfect harmony as shown by the Scriptures. We also under that 6,000 years of
earth’s history is past according to Bible chronology and that the seventh
thousand is the mellinnium [sic] of Christ’s reign – and that the present time
from 1874 to 1914 is the lapping period styled in Scripture the “harvest” of
the age, in which the number of the elect church will be completed, and that
then the millennial age will be ushered in by a great time of trouble, anarchy,
etc., mentioned repeatedly in Scripture which will level society, humble pride
and prepare the way for Immanuel’s long promised Kingdome “under the whole
heavens.”[8]
All of this is standard Watch Tower doctrine of the era. As with other former clergy,
Weatherwax assumed the leading position in the group. Meeting-time advertisements
note him as “Elder,” a common Methodist designation. As did a few other former
clergy, he continued to see himself as having special status. Based on his
short article for the Cortland paper, editors of nearby journals presented him as
the “founder of a new sect.” The Newburgh, New York, Register told its readers
that “the Rev. B. F. Weatherwax, formerly of this city, has withdrawn from the
Methodist Episcopal conference and has founded a new religious denomination.”[9] By
the end of April 1902, they were meeting in the W.C.T.U. Hall. Sunday services
were at 10
am, and a meeting for prayer
and Bible study was on Wednesday at 7:30 pm.[10]
Before 1890 either Russell or one of
the others most prominent in the Watch Tower ministry would visit newly formed groups. George B. Raymond,
a Watch Tower evangelist, visited the Cortland group twice. An announcement in the April 12, 1902, Cortland Standard said he’d address a meeting
of the church in Good Templars’ Hall. No subject was given. R. E. Streeter
visited The Church of the Little Flock in Cortland in July 1902 for two days. No subject was announced.
He was back in December 1902, Speaking Wednesday, December 3rd on
the topic “The Coming Kingdom,” and the next evening on “Restitution of All
Things.”[11] Raymond returned in early
May 1903, addressing the group twice. The Standard printed the
congregation’s statement of belief:
There are people who believe
the world is just entering the milennial [sic] reign of Christ, and that a wonderful
age of progress, both material and spiritual, is about to be ushered in,
preceded, however, by ten or fifteen years of intense strife and anarchy. They
believe that the earth and the great bulk of humanity, both present and past,
will, during the next thousand years, be restored to the perfection which 6,000
years ago was exampled in the Garden of Eden.
They reject the idea of eternal
torment, claiming it to be unscriptural; asserting that only those who are
guilty of sinning willfully against the fullest light (information) are to be
considered incorrigible; these and these only, are to be destroyed in the second
death.
They believe that God has for
6,000 years been allowing man to gain a sad experience with sin, and that he
will, during the next thousand years, the millennium, restrain sin, that man
may see righteousness n all of its beauty, and witness the blessed results of
its reign. Having had 6,000 years’ experience with sin and 1,000 years’
experience with righteousness, man will be well prepared to make a wise choice
as to which he will serve, and will then be tested by loosing of Satan to
deceive those who during this long period shall have failed to become well
grounded in godliness, Those being thus deceived will go down into the second
death from which there will be no resurrection.[12]
Despite this concise statement of Watch Tower belief, Weatherwax deviated from it that year. He encountered
Barbourite doctrine and adopted Barbour’s new chronology. Barbour expected the
final last-days acts to occur in 1907. Weatherwax preached that. His obituaries
report that the church “members believe the world ends in 1907.” We lack
details. We don’t know how he encountered Barbourite doctrine. We do not know
why he found it persuasive.[13]
Contrary to newspaper claims, most members of the Cortland church retained Watch Tower belief. We think that the congregation retained Weatherwax
because though he deviated in doctrine, they had tremendous respect for him. Writing
some months after he died, Isaac Edgecomb described him as “a man of great
faith.” Edgecomb was a Methodist, and wrote this despite Weatherwax’s defection
from that church.[14]
The small congregation continued, placing regular ads
in the Cortland paper through 1904. They numbered thirteen in 1906,
all of whom traveled to Binghampton, New York, on January 26th to hear Russell speak.[15] Cortland received two visits by traveling Watch Tower Pilgrims
in 1908, and persisted at least to 1917. We do not know if the current Witness
congregation is an outgrowth of the original group.
Syracuse, New York, Herald
Randolph Elwood Streeter
George B. Raymond
[1] Announcements: The World’s Hope¸ July 1884, page
152. The title appears to be Good News for All.
[2] Annual Report of the Brockport Free Library, The
Brockport, New York,
Republic, December 1, 1887.
[3] R.O.L to Paton, The World’s Hope, February 15,
1902, page 47.
[4] Blunden to Russell as found in the May 1, 1892, Watch Tower, pages 133-134.
[Not in Reprints.]
[5] Interesting Letters from Friends, Zion’s Watch Tower,
January 1, 1902, page 15.
[6] C. E. Fitch: Encyclopedia of Biography of New York:
A life Record of Men and Women Whose Sterling Character and Energy and Industry
Have Made Them Preëminent in Their Own and Many Other States, Volume 3.
[7] Drops Dean in Hen Yard, The Syracuse,
New York, Post-Standard, November 3, 1903. Founds a New Sect, Ogdensburg,
New York, News¸ November 12, 1901.
[8] B. F. Weatherwax: A Question of Belief, The
Courtland, New York,
Evening Standard, November 2, 1901.
We do not know if the grammar errors are his or the editor’s.
[9] Founds a New Sect, The Newburgh,
New York, Register, November 7, 1901.
[10] Church of the Little Flock, Cortland,
New York, Evening Standard,
April 25, 1902.
[11] Church of the Little Flock, Cortland,
New York, Evening Standard,
July 28, 1902.
[12] Two Meetings, Cortland,
New York, Evening Standard,
May 9, 1903.
[13] Drops Dead in Hen Yard, The Syracuse,
New York, Post-Standard¸ November 3, 1903; The Syracuse,
New York, Journal, November 9, 1903. There are possible
explanations as to how Weatherwax encountered Barbourite doctrine. W. Horace
Kirk, owner of a blacksmithing business and evangelist preacher, was interested
in the Church of the Little Flock. He attended a “convention of the Church of
the Little Flock in Binghampton, New
York, in May 1904. His business partner was a Hoyt,
some of whom were Adventist and Age-to-Come believers. There was through Kirk a
connection to Rochester and the
Fullers. Fullers were Barbourites. None of this raises to the level of sound
proof.
[15] To Attend Lecture, The Syracuse,
New York, Herald¸ January 27, 1906.