VII
RELIEF SOCIETY
1.
If you should encounter the name "Relief Society" on the woman's page of your newspaper, you'd probably pass over its common-placeness with the feeling that it is merely some local variation of a Ladies' Aid, or Sewing Circle idea. That is just what I did, for several years, down at San Diego. The name still didn't make much of an impression upon me when I saw it on fluttering banners that a throng of women followed in a colorful Armistice Day parade there in 1936.
In much the same way, the Relief Society, women's organization of Latter-day Saints' church, probably is quietly and effectively working right under your nose in your own home community. Its prosaic name is retained because of its historical significance. The name and the organization began more than a century ago, as the Female Relief Society of Nauvoo. As any of you who are familiar with the history of women's activities are aware, that was a full three-quarters of a century B.S. (Before Suffrage). This relief society, then, is one of the older of the women's organizations in America.
From its beginning, the Relief Society was adjusted to the task of giving the women of Mormondom an opportunity to fill their own cultural and spiritual needs, and to collectively apply their energies to the improvement of their community and way of life. Beginning at a time when there was no popular conception of a woman's place as being anywhere except in her kitchen if she were poor or in her parlor if she were rich, the Relief Society has progressed through a long series of works in the service of the community.
The society now is widespread and continues to grow. Despite its ancient heritage, however, it still has not reached the saturation point at which all eligible Mormon women are members. Although it has considerably expanded in keeping with the general growth of the church since celebrationof the Relief Society Centenary in 1942, a breakdown of its membership as of that date conveys an interesting idea of its distribution, and of the distribution of the members of the Mormon church. There were thenmore than 115,000 women who belonged to 2,202 organized branches, located all over the world on six of the seven continents, every continent, in fact, except the still unpopulated Antarctica.
On December 31, 1941, there were 105,812 women Relief Society members in the United States, distributed as follows: Alabama, 116; Alaska, 23; Arizona, 4,270; Arkansas, 22; California, 8,782; Colorado, 1,163; Connecticut, 32; Delaware, 9; District of Columbia, 93; Florida, 469; Georgia, 262; Hawaii, 1,027; Idaho, 16,981; Illinois, 476; Indiana, 315; Iowa, 82; Kansas, 115; Kentucky, 77; Louisiana, 171; Maine, 20; Maryland, 166; Massachusetts, 63; Michigan, 240; Minnesota, 214; Mississippi, 185; Missouri, 255; Montana, 871; Nebraska, 143; Nevada, 1,720; New Jersey, 35; New Mexico, 467; New York, 359; North Carolina, 258; North Dakota, 10; Ohio, 203; Oklahoma, 116; Oregon, 1,476; Pennsylvania, 177; Rhode Island, 12; South Carolina, 379; South Dakota, 39; Tennessee, 40; Texas, 686; Utah, 58,914; Vermont, 10; Virginia, 205; Washington, 962; West Virginia, 80; Wisconsin, 151; Wyoming, 2,871.
Distribution of Relief Society members in other countries on the same date was as follows: Argentina, 169; Australia, 213; Austria, 47; Brazil, 73; Canada, 2,063; Czechoslovakia, 51; Denmark, 241; France, 120; Germany, 2,230; Great Britain, 594; Mexico, 531; Netherlands, 267; New Zealand, 592; Norway, 360; Palestine, 27; Samoa, 497; South Africa, 110; Sweden, 275; Switzerland, 271; Tahiti, 254; and Tonga, 218.
Members of the Relief Society are the mature women of the church and are mostly mothers. There are other activity groups that usually hold more interest for younger women.
In much the same way, the Relief Society, women's organization of Latter-day Saints' church, probably is quietly and effectively working right under your nose in your own home community. Its prosaic name is retained because of its historical significance. The name and the organization began more than a century ago, as the Female Relief Society of Nauvoo. As any of you who are familiar with the history of women's activities are aware, that was a full three-quarters of a century B.S. (Before Suffrage). This relief society, then, is one of the older of the women's organizations in America.
From its beginning, the Relief Society was adjusted to the task of giving the women of Mormondom an opportunity to fill their own cultural and spiritual needs, and to collectively apply their energies to the improvement of their community and way of life. Beginning at a time when there was no popular conception of a woman's place as being anywhere except in her kitchen if she were poor or in her parlor if she were rich, the Relief Society has progressed through a long series of works in the service of the community.
The society now is widespread and continues to grow. Despite its ancient heritage, however, it still has not reached the saturation point at which all eligible Mormon women are members. Although it has considerably expanded in keeping with the general growth of the church since celebrationof the Relief Society Centenary in 1942, a breakdown of its membership as of that date conveys an interesting idea of its distribution, and of the distribution of the members of the Mormon church. There were thenmore than 115,000 women who belonged to 2,202 organized branches, located all over the world on six of the seven continents, every continent, in fact, except the still unpopulated Antarctica.
On December 31, 1941, there were 105,812 women Relief Society members in the United States, distributed as follows: Alabama, 116; Alaska, 23; Arizona, 4,270; Arkansas, 22; California, 8,782; Colorado, 1,163; Connecticut, 32; Delaware, 9; District of Columbia, 93; Florida, 469; Georgia, 262; Hawaii, 1,027; Idaho, 16,981; Illinois, 476; Indiana, 315; Iowa, 82; Kansas, 115; Kentucky, 77; Louisiana, 171; Maine, 20; Maryland, 166; Massachusetts, 63; Michigan, 240; Minnesota, 214; Mississippi, 185; Missouri, 255; Montana, 871; Nebraska, 143; Nevada, 1,720; New Jersey, 35; New Mexico, 467; New York, 359; North Carolina, 258; North Dakota, 10; Ohio, 203; Oklahoma, 116; Oregon, 1,476; Pennsylvania, 177; Rhode Island, 12; South Carolina, 379; South Dakota, 39; Tennessee, 40; Texas, 686; Utah, 58,914; Vermont, 10; Virginia, 205; Washington, 962; West Virginia, 80; Wisconsin, 151; Wyoming, 2,871.
Distribution of Relief Society members in other countries on the same date was as follows: Argentina, 169; Australia, 213; Austria, 47; Brazil, 73; Canada, 2,063; Czechoslovakia, 51; Denmark, 241; France, 120; Germany, 2,230; Great Britain, 594; Mexico, 531; Netherlands, 267; New Zealand, 592; Norway, 360; Palestine, 27; Samoa, 497; South Africa, 110; Sweden, 275; Switzerland, 271; Tahiti, 254; and Tonga, 218.
Members of the Relief Society are the mature women of the church and are mostly mothers. There are other activity groups that usually hold more interest for younger women.
2.
Relief Society is a living monument to the unusually advanced ideas that Joseph Smith held in regard to the position in society that ought to be held by women. For the year 1842, those ideas were rank radicalism of the most wide-eyed variety.
The prophet gave the women unprecedented honors for that day, but at the same time laid grave responsibiltiies upon their shoulders. In his message to them at the time of their organization, he spoke with the calm assurance of a man who knew he was ordained by God to chart a new course of life, to define the essence of a new holy philosophy. The message follows: "You will receive instructions through the order of the Priesthood which God has established, through the medium of those appointed to lead, guide and direct the affairs of the Church in this last dispensaion; and now I turn the key in your behalf in the name of the Lord, and this Society shall rejoice, and knowledge and intelligence shall flow down from this time henceforth; this is the beginning of better days to the poor and needy, who shall be made to rejoice and pour forth blessings on your heads."
Eighteen women gathered in a meeting room above the Joseph Smith store in Nauvoo on March 17, 1842. The prophet himself attended to organize them and give them his blessings. Accompanying him were two elders, John Taylor and Willard Richards. Among the women present were many whose names were to become famous in Mormon history. The eighteen were: Emma H. Smith, Sarah M. Cleveland, Phebe Ann Hawkes, Elizabeth Jones, Sophia Packard, Philinda Merrick, Martha Knight, Desdemona Fulmer, Elizabeth Ann Whitney, Bathsheba W. Smith, Phebe M. Wheeler, Elvira A. Coles (Cowles) (later Mrs. Holmes), Margaret A. Cook, Sarah M. Kimball, Eliza R. Snow, Sophia Robinson, Leonora Taylor and Sophia R. Marks. Eight more women who were unable to be present were also admitted as charter members. They were: Sarah Higbee, Thirza Cahoon, Kezia A. Morrison, Marinda N. Hyde, Abigail Allred, Mary Snider, Lydia D. Granger and Cynthia A. Eldredge.
Emma Smith, wife of the prophet, was unanimously elected the first president of the group. For her first counselor, she chose Sarah M. Cleveland, wife of Judge Cleveland of Nauvoo, and for second counselor, Elizabeth Ann Whitney, wife of Bishop Newell K. Whitney.
The earliest objectives sought by members of this society were two-fold: to improve their own minds and souls by study and fellowship, and to relieve the poor and needy. The society grew rapidly. Its biggest job at Nauvoo was to succor the families of men who were working without pay to build the Nauvoo temple. Relief Society members supplied the needs of these families and made shirts and other clothing for the laborers.
When the Mormons began their trek to the west, and during their earlier years in the Great Salt Lake Valley, the Relief Society leaders had little opportunity to call their members together in formal meetings. However, tbese women who had been inducted into the responsibilities of leadership in those few years of the flowering of Nauvoo, went about among the women on the march and in the valley, teaching them how to meet, with fortitude, the new situations in which they found themselves.
During these years of nomadic and agrarian existence, the women of Mormondom went back many centuries into history for the pattern of their behavior. Like their sisters of ancient Hebrew days, they took over primary social tasks that have become submerged and forgotten in our modern existence. They shared with those more needy than themselves, sustained and gave courage to their husbands, cared for the sick and distresesed, comforted the dying and laid away the dead - women's share in the classic, age-old division of labor among Hebrew and Christian peoples.
Most of these women, bear in mind, had not grown up on the frontier. This state of existence was not a natural one in their lives. For the most part, they had been converted to Mormonism from the older, more stable and more highly civilized communities of the eastern part of the United States, and of England. Many had come from comfortable and wealthy homes where, had they chosen to remain instead of following this mad religious fever, they could have spent all their days on earth without want or privation - and all eternity without honor.
During the first decade in what is now Utah, the Relief Society kept in existence through the medium of many temporary organizations. Everyone was poor and needy. The women met for sewing and quilting, and helped each other, as well as furnished clothing to wandering Indians.
Full vigor was put back into the organization when Brigham Young in 1866 called Eliza R. Snow to the tsak of assisting the bishops to organize branches of the society. Brother Brigham followed up this action, on December 31, 1867, with a direct request to every bishop to get the society under way in every ward. Brigham again pounded on this subject at the April general conference of 1868. Needless to say, with the weight of his personality behind it, the society soon got under way on a churchwide basis. It has flourished ever since.
The prophet gave the women unprecedented honors for that day, but at the same time laid grave responsibiltiies upon their shoulders. In his message to them at the time of their organization, he spoke with the calm assurance of a man who knew he was ordained by God to chart a new course of life, to define the essence of a new holy philosophy. The message follows: "You will receive instructions through the order of the Priesthood which God has established, through the medium of those appointed to lead, guide and direct the affairs of the Church in this last dispensaion; and now I turn the key in your behalf in the name of the Lord, and this Society shall rejoice, and knowledge and intelligence shall flow down from this time henceforth; this is the beginning of better days to the poor and needy, who shall be made to rejoice and pour forth blessings on your heads."
Eighteen women gathered in a meeting room above the Joseph Smith store in Nauvoo on March 17, 1842. The prophet himself attended to organize them and give them his blessings. Accompanying him were two elders, John Taylor and Willard Richards. Among the women present were many whose names were to become famous in Mormon history. The eighteen were: Emma H. Smith, Sarah M. Cleveland, Phebe Ann Hawkes, Elizabeth Jones, Sophia Packard, Philinda Merrick, Martha Knight, Desdemona Fulmer, Elizabeth Ann Whitney, Bathsheba W. Smith, Phebe M. Wheeler, Elvira A. Coles (Cowles) (later Mrs. Holmes), Margaret A. Cook, Sarah M. Kimball, Eliza R. Snow, Sophia Robinson, Leonora Taylor and Sophia R. Marks. Eight more women who were unable to be present were also admitted as charter members. They were: Sarah Higbee, Thirza Cahoon, Kezia A. Morrison, Marinda N. Hyde, Abigail Allred, Mary Snider, Lydia D. Granger and Cynthia A. Eldredge.
Emma Smith, wife of the prophet, was unanimously elected the first president of the group. For her first counselor, she chose Sarah M. Cleveland, wife of Judge Cleveland of Nauvoo, and for second counselor, Elizabeth Ann Whitney, wife of Bishop Newell K. Whitney.
The earliest objectives sought by members of this society were two-fold: to improve their own minds and souls by study and fellowship, and to relieve the poor and needy. The society grew rapidly. Its biggest job at Nauvoo was to succor the families of men who were working without pay to build the Nauvoo temple. Relief Society members supplied the needs of these families and made shirts and other clothing for the laborers.
When the Mormons began their trek to the west, and during their earlier years in the Great Salt Lake Valley, the Relief Society leaders had little opportunity to call their members together in formal meetings. However, tbese women who had been inducted into the responsibilities of leadership in those few years of the flowering of Nauvoo, went about among the women on the march and in the valley, teaching them how to meet, with fortitude, the new situations in which they found themselves.
During these years of nomadic and agrarian existence, the women of Mormondom went back many centuries into history for the pattern of their behavior. Like their sisters of ancient Hebrew days, they took over primary social tasks that have become submerged and forgotten in our modern existence. They shared with those more needy than themselves, sustained and gave courage to their husbands, cared for the sick and distresesed, comforted the dying and laid away the dead - women's share in the classic, age-old division of labor among Hebrew and Christian peoples.
Most of these women, bear in mind, had not grown up on the frontier. This state of existence was not a natural one in their lives. For the most part, they had been converted to Mormonism from the older, more stable and more highly civilized communities of the eastern part of the United States, and of England. Many had come from comfortable and wealthy homes where, had they chosen to remain instead of following this mad religious fever, they could have spent all their days on earth without want or privation - and all eternity without honor.
During the first decade in what is now Utah, the Relief Society kept in existence through the medium of many temporary organizations. Everyone was poor and needy. The women met for sewing and quilting, and helped each other, as well as furnished clothing to wandering Indians.
Full vigor was put back into the organization when Brigham Young in 1866 called Eliza R. Snow to the tsak of assisting the bishops to organize branches of the society. Brother Brigham followed up this action, on December 31, 1867, with a direct request to every bishop to get the society under way in every ward. Brigham again pounded on this subject at the April general conference of 1868. Needless to say, with the weight of his personality behind it, the society soon got under way on a churchwide basis. It has flourished ever since.
3.
There have been nine presidents of Relief Society since its beginning. Every one of them has contributed heavily on a national scale to the advancement of American culture, each of them guiding and coordinating her followers to secure whatever social goal seemed most desirable in her age and time. No organization anywhere has consistently been headed by personalities any more outstanding, whether man or woman.
The lives of all of these women were exceedingly interesting. At least two of them, Emmeling Wells and Amy Brown Lyman, have contributed so much in leadership ability, breadth of vision, fortitude and strength of character that their lives, if recorded by a competent author, could easily be the subjects of the most absorbing women's biographies in all literature. Emmeline Wells was a pioneer. Mrs. Lyman lives today.
The main value of the work of Emma Smith, first president of Relief Society lay in the fact that she had the courage to step out front as the leader of a women's organization in a time and day when women had no training nor background in public service. (In 1842, mind you) Emma collected the first general selection of hymns used in the Latter-day Saint church. When her husband was threatened with a host of persecutions by Illinois politicians who were growing panicky because the prophet's followers were increasing at such an amazing rate, Emma, in the company of Eliza R. Snow and Amanda Smith, made a trip to Quincy, Ill., to lay before Governor Carlin a petition of the Relief Society that the prophet be spared from persecutions. Such activity on the part of women was unheard of in that day, and this incident constitutes one of the earliest records of the organized participation in politics by American women.
After her husband's death, Emma Smith stayed in Nauvoo and married again, thus fading out of the Relief Society picture.
Eliza Roxey Snow, who had been a governess in the home of Joseph Smith at Kirtland, Ohio, and Nauvoo, and who had been married to him in the rite of plural marriage, brought the records of Relief Society to the Salt Lake Valley in the Mormon trek. She became general president of the organization by the call of Brigham Young in 1866, and until her death in 1877, imbued it with a personality that made many things possible.
Under Eliza Snow's leadership, Relief Society mothered both the Primary and the Young Ladies' Mutual Improvement associations. The society still retains responsibility for the providing of leadership for these church units. Eliza also was in charge of women's work at Endowment House, superintendent of the Women's Store and president of Deseret Hospital. In helping the women of her time to fully adjust themselves to their economic and social system, she encouraged them in handicrafts and home industry. Her own personal example was a guide to the intellectual advancement of Mormon women. A gifted poet, she was the composer of several Mormon hymns. The most famous of these, "O My Father", has gone beyond the limits of the Latter-day Saint church in the field in which it is appreciated. Her most well known prose work was a booklength biography of her brother, Lorenzo Snow, who was fourth president of the L.D.S. church.
For thirteen years, from 1888 to 1901, Zina D. Huntington Young, a wife of Brigham Young, was president of Relief Society. During her presidency the organization became affiliated with the National Council of Women. From the year 1870, she had worked to establish the silk industry in Utah in an effort to provide Mormon women with another home industry that would add to their income and financial independence. She was outstanding as a nurse, and herself practiced obstetrics many years. Under her influence, Relief Society carried forward an intensive program in nurse training.
Zina's life was colorful. It was full of hardship in her earlier years. Both her parents died as a result of anti-Mormon mob persecution. She married early, bore two sons, and then lost her husband. She afterward married Brigham Young, bore him one daughter and reared four of his other children.
The fourth president of Relief Society was Bathsheba Smith, wife of George A. Smith, who was a cousin of the prophet. At the age of nineteen, she had been the youngest woman present at the original organizational meeting in Nauvoo. She became president in 1901, and died in 1910, when she was 88. Bathsheba had but three children. One son died at Winter Quarters on the great trip westward, and the other son was killed by Indians while he was serving on a mission among them. However, Bathsheba lived to see her only daughter become the mother of fourteen children.
It was in Emmeline Wells that the pioneer tradition was brought on down to the year 1921. In all history, there are few women who have shown more dauntless courage than Emmeline. She was wife, mother, schoolteacher, publisher, editor, author, poet and executive. She had many outstanding friends among prominent women of the United States. For a long time she was publisher and editor of the Women's Exponent, Relief Society Magazine.
She directed the gathering and storing of wheat throughout the country by Mormon women as a bulwark against famine and panic. She sold this wheat to the United States government, which needed it for food supplies in World War I. A huge fund in Relief Society's treasury resulted. This grand scheme of wheat gathering and storing was an important step in the evolution of the famous church welfare Plan, which began in its present form in 1936.
Emmeline Wells did much to establish the prestige of Mormon women throughout the country. Her own career was so distinguished that her appearance at national assemblies of women, both as a delegate from Utah and as president of Relief Society, neer failed to create a stir.
Because of the protection which the early L.D.S. system of plural marriage afforded her, and because of her own tremendous force of character, Emmeline rose from poverty and obscurity to the highest position among Mormon women. When she was only sixteen, and pregnant, her husband deserted her to go with his family, who were deserting the church and leaving Nauvoo. Her faith in the new religion caused her to stay. That was in 1844. Her infant son died that autumn. She took refuge in the home of Bishop Newell K. Whitney, whom she married the following year. Bishop Whitney was already married. His, [sic] wife, Elizabeth Ann, was at that time second counselor in the presidency of Relief Society. Emmeline became the mother of two daughters for Bishop Whitney. The second of these was only five weeks old when the bishop died. Emmeline had taught school, already, in Massachusetts, at Nauvoo, and at Winter Quarters. So when she became widowed the second time, she went back to teaching school, at Salt Lake City. Two years later she married Daniel H. Wells, and spent the rest of her life in a security that allowed a full development of her talents. She became the mother of three more daughters. When her children began to grow older, she turned her tremendous energies to church work and other public service. Her prose writings constitute a valued source of authentic information about pioneer Mormons and her poetry has an entertaining quality.
Clarissa S. Williams, sixth general president of Relief Society, never missed any bets, either as a woman or as a leader. She was born of a polygamous marriage, her mother, Susan E. West Smith sharing with Bathsheba Smith the same husband, George A. Smith. Born in 1859, her powers of intellect soon demonstrated that she was a prodigy. She was graduated from the University of Deseret when she was only sixteen, and at once began to teach school. When she was eighteen, she married William N. Williams.
Beginning Relief Society work at the age of sixteen, she steadily progressed upward through every major position held by women in that organization until she became general president in 1921 at the age of sixty-two. And - she bore and raised eleven children.
Her business ability was outstanding. She combined the offices of secretary and treasurer and put the financial affairs of Relief Society upon a modern business basis. It was on her recommendation that money which had been derived from the sale of wheat to the government in 1918 was preserved in a central fund, from which the interest was to be used to finance health, maternity and child welfare work. She was an indefatigable traveler, and visited many parts of the United States and several foreign countries in behalf of Relief Society. She died in 1930, at the age of seventy, after a rest of only two years from the society presidency. She had voluntarily relinquished the position when her health began to fail, so as not to hinder the work.
A daugher of pioneer parents, growing up under all the hardships of early life in the west, Louise Y. Robison, serving as seventh president of Relief Society, confirmed and strengthened Mormon women in their ties with tradition. In her childhood, she had entered into the spirit of the Mormon culture by gleaning wheat, gathering Sunday eggs, sitting up with the sick and helping to care for the dead. All the early Mormon handicrafts were familiar to her. She had helped to wash, dye, spin and weave cloth, knit stockings and braid straw. She is the mother of six children.
In her administration, from 1928 until 1939, she served as a tie between Relief Society and child welfare work, Travelers' Aid and the American Red Cross. She traveled extensively.
A recent president of the Mormon women's organization, Amy Brown Lyman, has given a lifetime of service to the church, beginning at the age of eleven.
Long before she became president, she had succeeded in establishing Relief Society welfare work on a scientific basis, and during the first two years of her presidency, in 1940, Relief Society enjoyed a phenomenal growth. She has raised two chldren of her own and an orphaned granddaugher, as well. Her career in public service has been remarkable. She was graduated from Brigham Young Academy, and taught school there, as well as in Salt Lake City. She did special studies and field work in social welfare in the eastern part of the United States when the science of welfare work was just beginning to be established on a firm footing. She served as a member of the Utah state legislature and has held office in the National Council of Women. She aided in the establishment of Utah State Training School in 1929 and for eleven years served as a member of the board of trustees of that institution. She became a member of the Relief Society general board in 1909, and later became general secretary, in which position she overhauled and modernized the entire system of record keeping from branch and ward level on up to the top. She became first counselor in the Relief Society presidency in 1928. From 1936 to 1938, she presided over the women's organizations of the European Mission.
In her personal life, Amy Brown Lyman has successfully surmounted difficulties that would have floored a woman of any lesser strength of character, and has provided an example of womanly qualities that, for our day and time, stands as glorious as that of any of her illustrious pioneer predecessors.
The current president of Relief Society is Mrs. Belle Spafford. To her has fallen the huge task of managing the women's activities during celebration of the centennial of the founding of Salt Lake City.
The lives of all of these women were exceedingly interesting. At least two of them, Emmeling Wells and Amy Brown Lyman, have contributed so much in leadership ability, breadth of vision, fortitude and strength of character that their lives, if recorded by a competent author, could easily be the subjects of the most absorbing women's biographies in all literature. Emmeline Wells was a pioneer. Mrs. Lyman lives today.
The main value of the work of Emma Smith, first president of Relief Society lay in the fact that she had the courage to step out front as the leader of a women's organization in a time and day when women had no training nor background in public service. (In 1842, mind you) Emma collected the first general selection of hymns used in the Latter-day Saint church. When her husband was threatened with a host of persecutions by Illinois politicians who were growing panicky because the prophet's followers were increasing at such an amazing rate, Emma, in the company of Eliza R. Snow and Amanda Smith, made a trip to Quincy, Ill., to lay before Governor Carlin a petition of the Relief Society that the prophet be spared from persecutions. Such activity on the part of women was unheard of in that day, and this incident constitutes one of the earliest records of the organized participation in politics by American women.
After her husband's death, Emma Smith stayed in Nauvoo and married again, thus fading out of the Relief Society picture.
Eliza Roxey Snow, who had been a governess in the home of Joseph Smith at Kirtland, Ohio, and Nauvoo, and who had been married to him in the rite of plural marriage, brought the records of Relief Society to the Salt Lake Valley in the Mormon trek. She became general president of the organization by the call of Brigham Young in 1866, and until her death in 1877, imbued it with a personality that made many things possible.
Under Eliza Snow's leadership, Relief Society mothered both the Primary and the Young Ladies' Mutual Improvement associations. The society still retains responsibility for the providing of leadership for these church units. Eliza also was in charge of women's work at Endowment House, superintendent of the Women's Store and president of Deseret Hospital. In helping the women of her time to fully adjust themselves to their economic and social system, she encouraged them in handicrafts and home industry. Her own personal example was a guide to the intellectual advancement of Mormon women. A gifted poet, she was the composer of several Mormon hymns. The most famous of these, "O My Father", has gone beyond the limits of the Latter-day Saint church in the field in which it is appreciated. Her most well known prose work was a booklength biography of her brother, Lorenzo Snow, who was fourth president of the L.D.S. church.
For thirteen years, from 1888 to 1901, Zina D. Huntington Young, a wife of Brigham Young, was president of Relief Society. During her presidency the organization became affiliated with the National Council of Women. From the year 1870, she had worked to establish the silk industry in Utah in an effort to provide Mormon women with another home industry that would add to their income and financial independence. She was outstanding as a nurse, and herself practiced obstetrics many years. Under her influence, Relief Society carried forward an intensive program in nurse training.
Zina's life was colorful. It was full of hardship in her earlier years. Both her parents died as a result of anti-Mormon mob persecution. She married early, bore two sons, and then lost her husband. She afterward married Brigham Young, bore him one daughter and reared four of his other children.
The fourth president of Relief Society was Bathsheba Smith, wife of George A. Smith, who was a cousin of the prophet. At the age of nineteen, she had been the youngest woman present at the original organizational meeting in Nauvoo. She became president in 1901, and died in 1910, when she was 88. Bathsheba had but three children. One son died at Winter Quarters on the great trip westward, and the other son was killed by Indians while he was serving on a mission among them. However, Bathsheba lived to see her only daughter become the mother of fourteen children.
It was in Emmeline Wells that the pioneer tradition was brought on down to the year 1921. In all history, there are few women who have shown more dauntless courage than Emmeline. She was wife, mother, schoolteacher, publisher, editor, author, poet and executive. She had many outstanding friends among prominent women of the United States. For a long time she was publisher and editor of the Women's Exponent, Relief Society Magazine.
She directed the gathering and storing of wheat throughout the country by Mormon women as a bulwark against famine and panic. She sold this wheat to the United States government, which needed it for food supplies in World War I. A huge fund in Relief Society's treasury resulted. This grand scheme of wheat gathering and storing was an important step in the evolution of the famous church welfare Plan, which began in its present form in 1936.
Emmeline Wells did much to establish the prestige of Mormon women throughout the country. Her own career was so distinguished that her appearance at national assemblies of women, both as a delegate from Utah and as president of Relief Society, neer failed to create a stir.
Because of the protection which the early L.D.S. system of plural marriage afforded her, and because of her own tremendous force of character, Emmeline rose from poverty and obscurity to the highest position among Mormon women. When she was only sixteen, and pregnant, her husband deserted her to go with his family, who were deserting the church and leaving Nauvoo. Her faith in the new religion caused her to stay. That was in 1844. Her infant son died that autumn. She took refuge in the home of Bishop Newell K. Whitney, whom she married the following year. Bishop Whitney was already married. His, [sic] wife, Elizabeth Ann, was at that time second counselor in the presidency of Relief Society. Emmeline became the mother of two daughters for Bishop Whitney. The second of these was only five weeks old when the bishop died. Emmeline had taught school, already, in Massachusetts, at Nauvoo, and at Winter Quarters. So when she became widowed the second time, she went back to teaching school, at Salt Lake City. Two years later she married Daniel H. Wells, and spent the rest of her life in a security that allowed a full development of her talents. She became the mother of three more daughters. When her children began to grow older, she turned her tremendous energies to church work and other public service. Her prose writings constitute a valued source of authentic information about pioneer Mormons and her poetry has an entertaining quality.
Clarissa S. Williams, sixth general president of Relief Society, never missed any bets, either as a woman or as a leader. She was born of a polygamous marriage, her mother, Susan E. West Smith sharing with Bathsheba Smith the same husband, George A. Smith. Born in 1859, her powers of intellect soon demonstrated that she was a prodigy. She was graduated from the University of Deseret when she was only sixteen, and at once began to teach school. When she was eighteen, she married William N. Williams.
Beginning Relief Society work at the age of sixteen, she steadily progressed upward through every major position held by women in that organization until she became general president in 1921 at the age of sixty-two. And - she bore and raised eleven children.
Her business ability was outstanding. She combined the offices of secretary and treasurer and put the financial affairs of Relief Society upon a modern business basis. It was on her recommendation that money which had been derived from the sale of wheat to the government in 1918 was preserved in a central fund, from which the interest was to be used to finance health, maternity and child welfare work. She was an indefatigable traveler, and visited many parts of the United States and several foreign countries in behalf of Relief Society. She died in 1930, at the age of seventy, after a rest of only two years from the society presidency. She had voluntarily relinquished the position when her health began to fail, so as not to hinder the work.
A daugher of pioneer parents, growing up under all the hardships of early life in the west, Louise Y. Robison, serving as seventh president of Relief Society, confirmed and strengthened Mormon women in their ties with tradition. In her childhood, she had entered into the spirit of the Mormon culture by gleaning wheat, gathering Sunday eggs, sitting up with the sick and helping to care for the dead. All the early Mormon handicrafts were familiar to her. She had helped to wash, dye, spin and weave cloth, knit stockings and braid straw. She is the mother of six children.
In her administration, from 1928 until 1939, she served as a tie between Relief Society and child welfare work, Travelers' Aid and the American Red Cross. She traveled extensively.
A recent president of the Mormon women's organization, Amy Brown Lyman, has given a lifetime of service to the church, beginning at the age of eleven.
Long before she became president, she had succeeded in establishing Relief Society welfare work on a scientific basis, and during the first two years of her presidency, in 1940, Relief Society enjoyed a phenomenal growth. She has raised two chldren of her own and an orphaned granddaugher, as well. Her career in public service has been remarkable. She was graduated from Brigham Young Academy, and taught school there, as well as in Salt Lake City. She did special studies and field work in social welfare in the eastern part of the United States when the science of welfare work was just beginning to be established on a firm footing. She served as a member of the Utah state legislature and has held office in the National Council of Women. She aided in the establishment of Utah State Training School in 1929 and for eleven years served as a member of the board of trustees of that institution. She became a member of the Relief Society general board in 1909, and later became general secretary, in which position she overhauled and modernized the entire system of record keeping from branch and ward level on up to the top. She became first counselor in the Relief Society presidency in 1928. From 1936 to 1938, she presided over the women's organizations of the European Mission.
In her personal life, Amy Brown Lyman has successfully surmounted difficulties that would have floored a woman of any lesser strength of character, and has provided an example of womanly qualities that, for our day and time, stands as glorious as that of any of her illustrious pioneer predecessors.
The current president of Relief Society is Mrs. Belle Spafford. To her has fallen the huge task of managing the women's activities during celebration of the centennial of the founding of Salt Lake City.
4.
Welfare activiites of Relief society, which began with the birth of the organization, have been carefully adjusted to suit the needs of the Mormon community throughout more than a century of growth and change.
Relief Society leaders at once gave full value to the body of scientific knowledge that developed in this field during the past fifty years, and saw to it that the work of Mormon women was guided along thoroughly modern lines. They placed emphasis upon family welfare work. With the institution of the Welfare Plan of the church in 1936 as a duty of the priesthood on a churchwide basis, the president of the ward Relief Society became the chief assitant to the ward bishop in seeking out and confidentially reporting the welfare needs of families of the community.
Under immediate direction of the general board, the Relief Society welfare center at Salt Lake City serves: (a) as a center for cooperative work in Salt Lake City between stakes and wards and between L.D.S. and non-L.D.S. agencies in the interest of L.D.S. families in distress; (b) as a center for L.D.S. transients and non-residents in need; (c) as an L.D.S. confidential exchange and clearing house for welfare information (d) as an employment center for Relief Society women engaged in charity and relief work; and (f) as the official child-placing agency of the church, licensed by the state of Utah since 1927. Branch offices, each under a trained social worker, have been maintained in Los Angeles and Ogden since 1940.
In 1920, the Relief Society began to conduct intensive six-week summer courses in family welfare work at Brigham Young University. This training has since then been extended to local jurisdictions throughout the church.
Visiting teachers of Relief Society, whose duty it is to visit every family in Mormondom at least once a month, have through the years gathered information for their president to use in apportioning aid, have accepted donations for welfare work, and have carried into the homes a discussion of the lesson or message set out for that month.
Since the beginning of the Welfare Plan, the various units of Relief Society throughout the church have organized and directed efforts of Mormon women in producing all manner of needed articles, such as food, clothing bedding, furniture, for filling the bishops' storehouses.
One Relief Society meeting of every month is reserved for sewing for the needy.
Beginning with the organization of a physiological and nursing class by Sarah M. Kimball in 1872, Relief Society has actively sponsored the training of nurses, practical nurses and nurses' aides. Several Mormon women have become outstanding doctors. The Mormons, as a church, have been comparatively late in entering the hospitalization field. It was the pioneering efforts of Relief Society members, and their Deseret Hospital in Salt Lake City, that finally provided the impetus necessary for the beginning of a hospitalization program on a scale commensurate with that of other churches. The main hospital program now is expanding under the direct eye of the general authorities of the church and modern L.D.S. hospitals in Salt Lake City, Murray, and Ogden in Utah; Idaho Falls, Idaho; and Afton Wyoming point the way to the possibility that Mormons might yet become a major factor in providing hospital facilities for the nation.
Maternal and child welfare work, disaster and war relief, and a steadily pushed, standardized educational program are among the things that have provided Mormon women with a community interest for many years.
The Priesthood for men and Relief Society for women are the two organizations that give backbone to Mormon culture. These two, working together side-by-side, have produced all other institutions and characteristics of Mormondom.
It is curious to note that Relief Society does not have a written constitution but takes all its general policies for guidance through instructions from the priesthood. Thse instructions are pronounced from time to time in the spirit and principle of continuing revelation from God. Relief Society also has no by-laws that could generally be recognized as such, but in the absence of definite instructions to the contrary from the priesthood, patterns its actions on precedent, as recorded in the minutes of past meetings, very much as a court of law would render decisions upon the basis of the accumulated jurisprudence of centuries of courts that have preceeded [sic] it.
Unlike many women's clubs and sororities, Relief Society has not evolved for the purpose of providing women with careers and outlets for their personalities apart from, or opposed to, or in competition with the leadership of the men of the community. Throughout the years, it has closely teamed with the priesthood in the fundamental social conception that man and woman were destined for partnership, that either is incomplete without the other. The women have sustained and followed their men through every hardship and every time of easy sailing. Both have been the better for it.
For through all their accomplishments as organized women, in which field they took the leadership of the American nation, Mormon women have never forgotten the other part of the message which the prophet Joseph Smtih delivered to them that afternoon above the little store building in Nauvoo, which was:
"Let this Society teach women how to behave toward their husbands, to treat them with mildness and affection. When a husband is borne down with trouble, when he is perplexed with care and difficulty, if he can meet with a smile instead of an argument or a murmur - if he can meet with mildness, it will calm down his soul and soothe his feelings; when the mind is going to despair, it needs a solace of affection and kindness."
Next: Church Welfare Program
Relief Society leaders at once gave full value to the body of scientific knowledge that developed in this field during the past fifty years, and saw to it that the work of Mormon women was guided along thoroughly modern lines. They placed emphasis upon family welfare work. With the institution of the Welfare Plan of the church in 1936 as a duty of the priesthood on a churchwide basis, the president of the ward Relief Society became the chief assitant to the ward bishop in seeking out and confidentially reporting the welfare needs of families of the community.
Under immediate direction of the general board, the Relief Society welfare center at Salt Lake City serves: (a) as a center for cooperative work in Salt Lake City between stakes and wards and between L.D.S. and non-L.D.S. agencies in the interest of L.D.S. families in distress; (b) as a center for L.D.S. transients and non-residents in need; (c) as an L.D.S. confidential exchange and clearing house for welfare information (d) as an employment center for Relief Society women engaged in charity and relief work; and (f) as the official child-placing agency of the church, licensed by the state of Utah since 1927. Branch offices, each under a trained social worker, have been maintained in Los Angeles and Ogden since 1940.
In 1920, the Relief Society began to conduct intensive six-week summer courses in family welfare work at Brigham Young University. This training has since then been extended to local jurisdictions throughout the church.
Visiting teachers of Relief Society, whose duty it is to visit every family in Mormondom at least once a month, have through the years gathered information for their president to use in apportioning aid, have accepted donations for welfare work, and have carried into the homes a discussion of the lesson or message set out for that month.
Since the beginning of the Welfare Plan, the various units of Relief Society throughout the church have organized and directed efforts of Mormon women in producing all manner of needed articles, such as food, clothing bedding, furniture, for filling the bishops' storehouses.
One Relief Society meeting of every month is reserved for sewing for the needy.
Beginning with the organization of a physiological and nursing class by Sarah M. Kimball in 1872, Relief Society has actively sponsored the training of nurses, practical nurses and nurses' aides. Several Mormon women have become outstanding doctors. The Mormons, as a church, have been comparatively late in entering the hospitalization field. It was the pioneering efforts of Relief Society members, and their Deseret Hospital in Salt Lake City, that finally provided the impetus necessary for the beginning of a hospitalization program on a scale commensurate with that of other churches. The main hospital program now is expanding under the direct eye of the general authorities of the church and modern L.D.S. hospitals in Salt Lake City, Murray, and Ogden in Utah; Idaho Falls, Idaho; and Afton Wyoming point the way to the possibility that Mormons might yet become a major factor in providing hospital facilities for the nation.
Maternal and child welfare work, disaster and war relief, and a steadily pushed, standardized educational program are among the things that have provided Mormon women with a community interest for many years.
The Priesthood for men and Relief Society for women are the two organizations that give backbone to Mormon culture. These two, working together side-by-side, have produced all other institutions and characteristics of Mormondom.
It is curious to note that Relief Society does not have a written constitution but takes all its general policies for guidance through instructions from the priesthood. Thse instructions are pronounced from time to time in the spirit and principle of continuing revelation from God. Relief Society also has no by-laws that could generally be recognized as such, but in the absence of definite instructions to the contrary from the priesthood, patterns its actions on precedent, as recorded in the minutes of past meetings, very much as a court of law would render decisions upon the basis of the accumulated jurisprudence of centuries of courts that have preceeded [sic] it.
Unlike many women's clubs and sororities, Relief Society has not evolved for the purpose of providing women with careers and outlets for their personalities apart from, or opposed to, or in competition with the leadership of the men of the community. Throughout the years, it has closely teamed with the priesthood in the fundamental social conception that man and woman were destined for partnership, that either is incomplete without the other. The women have sustained and followed their men through every hardship and every time of easy sailing. Both have been the better for it.
For through all their accomplishments as organized women, in which field they took the leadership of the American nation, Mormon women have never forgotten the other part of the message which the prophet Joseph Smtih delivered to them that afternoon above the little store building in Nauvoo, which was:
"Let this Society teach women how to behave toward their husbands, to treat them with mildness and affection. When a husband is borne down with trouble, when he is perplexed with care and difficulty, if he can meet with a smile instead of an argument or a murmur - if he can meet with mildness, it will calm down his soul and soothe his feelings; when the mind is going to despair, it needs a solace of affection and kindness."
Next: Church Welfare Program
