Social Welfare History Project Organizations Page 6

Barrett, Janie Porter (1865 – 1948)

Janie Porter Barrett (1865 -1948): Founder of the Locust Street Social Settlement (1890) and the Virginia Industrial School for Colored Girls (1915)

Twilight, Alexander (1795 – 1857)

For the next twelve years he learned reading, writing and math skills while performing various farming duties. He was able to save enough (probably with some assistance from the farmer for whom he labored) to enroll in Randolph’s Orange County Grammar School in 1815 at the age of 20. During the next six years (1815-1821) he completed not only the secondary school courses but also the first two years of a college level curriculum. Following his graduation from Randolph he was accepted at Middlebury College, entering as a junior in August of 1821. Two years later he received his bachelor’s degree. Middlebury College claims him to be the first African-American to earn a baccalaureate degree from an American college or university.

Harmony Society: A Utopian Community

The Harmony Society, also called the Rappites, were similar to the Shakers in certain beliefs. Named after their founder, Johann Georg Rapp, the Rappites immigrated from Württemburg, Germany, to the United States in 1803, seeking religious freedom. Establishing a colony in Butler County, Pennsylvania, called Harmony, the Rappites held that the Bible was humanity’s sole authority.

Amana Colonies: A Utopian Community

“The Amana Colonies were one of many utopian colonies established on American soil during the 18th and 19th centuries. There were hundreds of communal utopian experiments in the early United States, and the Shakers alone founded around 20 settlements. While great differences existed between the various utopian communities or colonies, each society shared a common bond in a vision of communal living in a utopian society.”

Shakers – A Utopian Community: Founded In U.S. 1776

Formally known as the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Coming, the Shakers developed their own religious expression which included communal living, productive labor, celibacy, pacifism, the equality of the sexes, and a ritual noted for its dancing and shaking.

Oneida Community (1848-1880): A Utopian Community

The Oneida Community (1848-1880) was a religiously based, socialist group, dedicated to living as one family and to sharing all property, work, and love. They called their 93,000 square foot home the Mansion House.

United Neighborhood Houses, Fiftieth Anniversary – 1951

Address by Mr. Mark A. McCloskey, 1951. “Above all, the settlements are called upon to continue to be free, to list where they will, to be different in emphasis, varied in interest and program as well as personal leadership, but called to unity and joint action in support of our common humanity. Time will not tame the settlements in the next fifty years.”

State Boards Of Charities: A Report Of The Committee – 1889

Report by H. Hastings Hart presented at the Sixteenth Annual Session of The National Conference of Charities and Correction. “A board of charities is a balance-wheel to steady the motion of the charitable machinery of the State. It is its office to promote the wise founding and the safe running of public charities, to correct and prevent abuses, to check extravagance, to promote economy, and to rebuke niggardliness.”

The Indispensable Volunteer

The American Red Cross glorifies the volunteer while recognizing the essential place of the professional worker. The tasks of the Red Cross have required many hands. Its services have been nation-wide. Every county has needed its service, and its scheme of service has needed every county’s support and participation. War time; the rehabilitation days for the disabled veteran; the period of great drought, flood, or other disaster; the time of national unemployment—all these have required an army of workers. The professional workers of the world were not enough alone. When Government wheat and cotton distribution reaches all of the counties but 17, a great system of volunteer participation is necessary. This participation of the layman and laywoman must be recognized as vital. There must be that recognition first of all.

Committee On Youth Councils Of The Welfare Council Of New York City: A Report — 1949

As a result of the growing conviction about the necessity for active participation by youth in their own and community affairs, the Welfare Council of New York and the Civilian Defense Volunteer Office included two hundred young people as participants in the Youth Conference sponsored by those organizations and held at City Hall on January 13, 1945.