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Traces That Remain:
A Pictorial History of the Early Days of the Bahá'í Faith among the Japanese
edited by Sheridan Sims
Chapter 2
2. The First Bahá'í Group in the Pacific
Miss Agnes Alexander wrote of the early days of
the Faith in Hawaii, "As there was no home where the group could meet, Miss
Muther, Clarence Smith and I would go on Saturday afternoons by trolley car to
Pacific Heights. There on the hilltop, surrounded by nature, we would read
together the Bahá'í prayers and Tablets which illumined our hearts and minds.
Thus began the first Bahá'í meetings in Hawaii."
On this day in April 1903, the first photograph of a Bahá'í meeting in the
Pacific was taken. Mr. Yamamoto is on the left. Next is Mrs. Anna Bailey, a
Bahá'í from Oakland, California, who joined the group that day. Next are Miss
Elizabeth Muther and Miss Alexander, who was the first Bahá'í in the Pacific.
Mr. Clarence Smith, Hawaii's second believer took the
photograph.
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click here for larger image
Hawaii, 1909. This photograph shows five
Bahá'ís who responded to 'Abdu'l-Bahá's wish to take the Faith to Japan. Mr.
Howard Struven (far left) and C.M. Remey (middle rear) were on an
around-the-world teaching trip, the first ever made by Bahá'ís. They then
crossed the Pacific Ocean, stopped in Tokyo and spoke at the YMCA, then to
Yokohama, Kyoto, Nagasaki and on to China, Burma, India and other
countries.
Dr. George Augur (far right) arrived in Japan in 1914. His wife Ruth,
(front, far left) joined him on a later trip. They were in Japan off and on
until 1919.
Miss Alexander (sitting next to Mrs. Augur) arrived in Japan in 1914
several months after Dr. Augur. Between 1914 and 1967, when Miss Alexander left
for the last time, she spent a total of about thirty-one years teaching the
Faith in Japan. In 1957 the Guardian appointed her a Hand of the Cause and
called her "an exemplary pioneer."
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