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Tuesday, June 4, 2019

Can you add to this?

The story of Russell era adherents is as important as Russell's own story but much harder to follow. Can you add to these short biographies:


H. V. “Minnie” Peterson and Viola Townsend

            Minnie Peterson and Viola Townsend were the first two adherents in St. Paul and Minneapolis. However, as significant as that is, we know little about either of them. Minnie was born January 20, 1858, in Germany, immigrating to America in 1883 when she was sixteen. She married William P. Peterson in Wisconsin, and they immigrated to Minnesota sometime between 1890 and 1894. Her obituary describes her as, “Having been reared from the earliest childhood by Christian parents.” She was, said her obituary, a devout Christian, “ever loving to know more of God’s Word.” We do not know the exact date of her conversion to Watch Tower faith, but she was an enduring and faithful member of the St. Paul congregation. Again, from her obituary we have this:

She was a faithful class attendant and a diligent student of the Word. Although of a quiet retiring disposition, it delighted her soul to bear witness at every opportunity to the old, old story of Jesus and His love. She was wholly devoted to spiritual things, and in holding up the banner of truth and righteousness.[1]

            That’s the entire story as we know it. It is frustratingly brief and just as frustratingly incomplete. And we know less about Viola Townsend. She is mentioned in a letter printed in the November 1, 1896, Watch Tower, but the reference is incidental, adding nothing to our understanding.[2]

Alfred Henry Furley

            A. H. Furley [1865 – 1947] was an English born immigrant, listed as a “laborer” in the 1895 Minnesota state census. Furley was, as were many, probably most, Watch Tower adherents, seeking to conform to the Divine Will as expressed in the Bible. He believed that God led him into “His marvelous light.” He had, he wrote, the elements of ‘truth’ early in life: The need for a savior; the need for a Ransom from sin; and the obligation to obey “my dear Heavenly Father.” He associated with the Salvation Army, but found many religiously divergent voices among them. “I came across many people with so many different views,” He wrote. “Here indeed was confusion – Babylon – making it extremely difficult, if not impossible, for those not in the Truth, to know which were the right views.” He characterized 1885 to 1893 as years of religious instability: “I was drifting about in confusion, but gathering the Truth from Scriptures little by little.”[3]
            A Watch Tower colporteur found him sometime in 1893. Leaving the colporteur unnamed, he described their interaction this way:

There came to me in Duluth, Minn., a colporteur who asked me, if I did not wish to buy a book. On my inquiring what it contained, he explained to me some of its contents. I readily saw that it was different from any other book. Our talk drifted along and one question led to another until we came to the subject of the soul, he wishing to know how I harmonize my view with the Scriptures, “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.”

I did not buy the book at that time, but later a tract was left with me, and I saw that I could get the book on loan, so I sent for it – it proved to be “The Divine Plan of the Ages.” And it surely was a wonderful book, making everything so plain, which before had been so full of mystery.

            The tract is unidentifiable, at least by us. And Furley’s narrative leaves the exact dates of this transaction vague. He was isolated from others “of like precious faith,” and in 1903 inserted an ad into the personals section of The Duluth, Minnesota, Evening Herald, seeking others “interested in Zion’s Watch Tower and Millennium Dawn Series.” We do not know the result, and the remainder of Furley’s story is illusive.



Arthur Cumberland

            Cumberland was an immigrant, born in England December 9 1826. The 1900 United States census dated his immigration to 1833. Various census records list his occupation as teacher and farmer, not an unusual combination in that era, especially on the frontier. His obituary reported that “he came into the truth in 1882” while he was living in Mantorville, a very small village. It does not give particulars but the date suggests he read Food for Thinking Christians and was convinced by it. He started reading and saving Watch Tower publications, finally accumulating “a full set of Towers bound and complete from the first issue up to date.” [1916] He became a serious Bible reader. His obituary said: “He was one of the best read brothers in the Scripture we ever met. If we gave him a part of a quotation, he would give it to us in full and tell you where to find it.” The obituary reported him as an earnest worker, the mainstay of the Rochester, Minnesota class. His last few years were spent in Canada, also working to further the Watch Tower message. Of his children, two of his daughters were also Watch Tower adherents. He died August 27, 1916, still an adherent.


[1]              Details from the 1900 US Census and Mrs. Minnie Peterson [Obituary], The St. Paul, Minnesota, New Era Enterprise, April 27, 1926.
[2]               Encouraging Words from Faithful Workers, Zion’s Watch Tower, November 1, 1896, page 264. [Not in Reprints.]
[3]               Furley to editor of The St. Paul, Minnesota, Enterprise, January 29, 1918.

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