Miquel!

Thanks for what you sent. Hugely important things in that group.
Rachael

Out of Babylon: Current Work - Temporary post

If you copy this for personal use, please don't share it off the blog.

Out of Babylon

            There is almost no record of the earliest congregations’ internal structure or of the nature of their meetings. Though meeting guidance was given as early as 1884, a standard meeting format wasn’t introduced until the 1890s, and nature of meetings varied by place. To understand them we must rely on comments made in later decades. While some of his observations were appropriate to later years, the anonymous author of the Watchtower series “The Modern History of Jehovah’s Witnesses” accurately describes affiliated congregations in the period before 1900:

Thanks for the comments, everyone! Helpful and encouraging. The rest of this post is deleted.

James E. Fitch - As we have it now.

James Edwin Fitch

            J. E. Fitch (1830-1926) was an early Washington Territory pioneer and Methodist clergyman. In the late 1850s Fitch was in Wisconsin, working in cooperation with a Baptist missionary “for the purpose of showing to the world how well Christians could agree, and to show their love for the churches; and a revival ensued whereby many were saved from the sin of the world, taken into the Churches.” About two hundred converts were added to the Methodist church during the first year (1857-1858) of Fitch’s ministry in Wisconsin.[1] In 1868 Fitch was in Iowa.[2] His ministry within the Methodist church seems to have been successful.

            In 1882 Fitch was living in North Prosser, Washington. Fitch read Food for Thinking Christians and was convinced by it. He recounted his conversion to Watch Tower doctrine in a letter to The St. Paul, Minnesota, Enterprise: “The Holy Sprit led my companion and self out of darkness into light, 36 years ago, by reading and studying that blessed little booklet, ‘Food for Thinking Christians,’ and the later restitution publications, ‘Searching the Scriptures daily whether these things were so.’ We have never doubted these precious harvest truths from that day to this.”[3] He and his wife left the Methodist Church which he later referred to as the “barren desert of Methodism.”

            We did not find a reference to Fitch in The Watch Tower, so his work within the Watch Tower movement is unclear. However, we run across him in one of the first person interviews that sometimes contribute to our research. In the late 1970s and early 1980s the elder of us interviewed surviving members of the Hazen family, long time residents of the lower Yakima River Valley. Kermit Hazen, an elder in the Pasco, Washington, congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses recalled his father’s interaction with an aged and infirm former colporteur. Though the connection is tenuous, we think this is Fitch. He lived in the right place, near Prosser, Washington. The aged colporteur’s family opposed Watch Tower teachings. Fitch’s family presents him as a Methodist. The 1900 United States Census notes Fitch as “a preacher,” hence a colporteur within Watch Tower parlance.

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[1]               History of Vernon County, Wisconsin: Together with Sketches of Its Towns, Union Publishing Company, Springfield, Illinois, 1884, page 406.

[2]               Minutes of the Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church for 1868, New York, page 188.

[3]               Found in the March 12, 1918, issue.

The "Mailing Tracts"

 

We need clear scans of  tracts 7, 9, 10, 13, 14, 17, 18, 19, 20, and 21. Can you help?

James E. Fitch

Letter from Fitch in March 12, 1918 St. Paul Enterprise

He lived in Washington State at the time of writing.

We need some basic biography for him. Can you help?

Just a reminder ...

Some of our readers feel a sense of ownership when it comes to this blog. But the blog belongs to Mr. Schulz and myself. We set the rules, enforce them and make policy.Often if you see a scold or a restatement of the rules, we will not tell you why we did that. Assume you don't know the whole story.

We do not care what religion you are; you many not break the rules. 

Jerome or Roberto

Help me if you can. I want to block visits from S. Korea and Russia, the entire countries.

I'm asking politely. Since neither the Russian nor the Korean visitors to this blog can abide by the rules, I'm asking you to stop visiting this blog. I don't want you here. You have absolutely no ethical standards. A thief is a thief. You are not free to use our material without our consent. Stop it and go away. Be nice little boys.

In the past week ...

In the past week we've had about 100 visits from South Korea, and in the past month 150 visits, but NO comments. Why is that? Do you feel free to use our material without even a thanks? Civilized behavior demands a thank you when others further your research, does it not?

You are making me uncomfortable and suspicious. It takes effort to block an entire country. I'm asking you to state your reason for coming to this blog or to go away and stay away. If I have to block the entire country of South Korea I will. I'd rather you just respect the rules here and GO AWAY.

The material on this blog is copyrighted. You are not fee to use it without permission. Even if that's the usual practice in Korea.

Roberto!

Thanks for crafting the new header. Much appreciated.
Rachael

So you know

I'm swamped with end of semester stuff and planning a teacher (and para-educator) training day for staff. So you may not see much new material on the blog for two or three weeks.

We have a new reader (or readers) from Korea. If that's you, leave a comment and introduce yourself. We lost a couple of readers to a fit of temper. Shame on you. All we ask is that you keep your comments to historical matters. We respect everyone's religious views, but we do not debate them here. If that bothers you, then you do not belong here. Restating rules that have been in place here since the blog was started is not a scold.

We need Russell era controversialist booklets and articles, especially those published before 1910.

There are several Hessler family obituaries that might lead to living family. The obits suggest the family continued as Jehovah's Witnesses. Anyone volunteer to trace living family and contact them?

If you email me and don't get an immediate reply, know that I'm not ignoring you. I'm very busy. Sometimes you have to wait. If you don't hear from me in a week, resend the email.

Mr. Schulz is some better, but please do not email him. He works on our project, sleeps a lot, and his work is limited to a few hours a week. Please direct your questions and comments to me.

I was asked about blog 2, the private blog. It is inactive. 

Comment

Mr. Schulz and I invest a huge amount of money and work to further our research. We don't ask you for money. We do like comments. The same two - sometimes three - people comment. Everyone else that visits this blog avoids commenting. Even an "interesting" or "well done" is good.

Lack of comments is personally discouraging. You want this work to continue? An occasional comment helps.

Remember this?

From the chapter titled Out of Babylon (with slight revisions)

The Woodworths were not alone. Others represented pre-existing interest in Scranton. Among them was D. M. Hessler. We know little about Daniel Milburn Hessler. (1860-1917) He was a prominent citizen, owning a laundry business in Scranton with branches in New Jersey, Indiana and Pennsylvania. He appears once in the Watch Tower through a letter to Russell in February 1891, and he named a son born that year Charles Russell Hessler. Commenting on a new cover design for Zion’s Watch Tower, we find him expressing his strongly held belief:

I received January number last night and quickly noticed the new suit in which the tower is clothed. I feel sure that the improvement will be greatly appreciated by its readers. The emblem of the cross and crown is an appropriate and beautiful design to be worn by the tower. Its presence should ever encourage, sustain and comfort the household of faith. It should also be a warning or reminder; for as the cross and crown are inseparable in the design, so the two are to be inseparably associated in the experience of the overcomers. If we would wear the crown we must bear the cross.[1]

            Hessler drops out of the record with this letter. We do not know if he maintained his interest or how active he was within the Scranton congregation. By  July 1895, meetings were held in George W. Hessler’s home at 728 Green Ridge Street. Erlenmyer would have directed the Woodworths to this meeting. The one notice of it appears in the July 13, 1895, Scranton, Pennsylvania, Tribune:

The Watch Tower Bible class will meet at the residence of G. W. Hessler, 728 Green Ridge street, [sic] Sunday, July 14, at 10 a. m. The subject will be “Restitution of all things which God hath spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets since the world began,” Acts, iii 21. The leader will also explain from the “Chart of the Ages” the special call of this gospel age, “The straight gate and narrow way to life, and the few there be that find it.” Matt. Vii, 14.

            We do not know who the class “leader” was, but we do know something of George Hessler. [died May 1913] He was a cabinet maker, “well known in building circles,” and a member of the Improved Order of Heptasophs, a fraternal organization. Hessler was an inventor, holding patents for a ‘book holder’ and a toilet chair.[2] A German immigrant, he became a citizen in February 1909.[3] Later in life he invested in a Cuban gold mine and he was swindled.[4] As with Daniel Hessler, we do not know if he maintained his interest. When his daughter Hazel was married in 1905, it was by the “Reverend Stahl.”[5] This cannot be taken as evidence of later belief because in this era adherents turned to clergy for weddings. Few Watch Tower evangelists were recognized by state or county officials to perform marriages.

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[1]               Extracts from Interesting Letters, Zion’s Watch Tower, February 1891, page 29.

[2]               U.S. Patents numbers 263,290 and 752,551.

[3]               Scranton Wochenblatt, February 25, 1909.

[4]               The Scranton, Pennsylvania, Truth, January 12, 1911.

[5]               The Scranton, Pennsylvania, Truth¸ June 7, 1905.

D. M. Hessler's son Charles Russell served at Bethel in the 1940s and is mentioned in the 1943 Yearbook. Can anyone help us connect with Hessler relations who are still Jehovah's Witnesses?

Benjamin Ford Weatherwax

1836-1903

As featured in recent chapter on this blog "Out of Babylon"

With grateful thanks to Diana via Ancestry.com who is a vaguely distant relation. She gives permission for the photograph to be reproduced as we see fit.

Not so wild wild suspcion

The evidence is so slim as to be suspect, very suspect, but we're working on the supposition that Brother van der Ahe was Chris von (also van) der Ahe, the owner of the Browns baseball team. All we have is the possibility that he met a Watch Tower evangelist in New York. We think the possibility is strong. He had a connection to Pittsburgh, were he was well known.

We need to prove or disprove this. We're up against a brick wall. Can you do better?

We believe his interest was short lived. We believe that personal difficulties started it and ended it. But, everything is just suspicion. Help!

We probably have to give this up, as fun as it would be to have a drunken baseball club owner in the story. Our focus has switched to William Van der Ahe, aka vonderahe and vondera, etc. He appears to have been a clerk, maybe in Russell's Federal Street Store. HELP!

It's time (We think) ...

To start preparing Separate Identity, volume one, for ebook format. The first step is to make corrections to the text. Send me a list of the "literary owies" you've found in the test.

Roberto, can we ...

Can we add some sort of "Please visit our newest posts. We'd love to see your feedback." thing to the blog title?
R

"Fringe" items

A sample of the kind of advertisements that started appearing in the St Paul Enterprise newspaper in 1917. If any survived they would be highly collectable today.

I rather like the "Four pages, over 2,000 yards..."

Richards again ...

We need to know if he shows up in The Watch Tower in the 1920s and 1930s. Anyone help?

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 “

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[1]               “Out of Darkness into his Marvelous Light,” Zion’s Watch Tower, March 1, 1893, page 78.

We must

We must be boring everyone.

I wish...

St Paul Enterprise, 1917