Biography

Barton, Clara

Clara Barton
Clara Barton

Clara Barton (December 25, 1821-April 12, 1912) was both famous and honored in her lifetime—and has a well-earned place in American history—as the angel of Civil War battlefields and founder of the American Red Cross.

Clarissa Harlowe Barton, the fifth and youngest child of Sarah Stone and Stephen Barton, was born on Christmas Day, 1821, in Oxford, Massachusetts, a small farming community.

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Singh, Hajom Kissor

Hajom Kissor Singh
Hajom Kissor Singh

Hajom Kissor Singh (June 15, 1865-November 13, 1923) was born and lived all his life in the Khasi Hills of the state of Meghalaya in northeastern India. With no knowledge of the faith in other lands, he became a unitarian through his own studies.

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Sunderland, Jabez Thomas

Jabez Thomas Sunderland
Jabez Thomas Sunderland

Jabez Thomas Sunderland (February 11, 1842-August 13, 1936) was a Unitarian minister and reformer. Attempting to influence the direction of American Unitarian development, he unsuccessfully opposed Jenkin Lloyd Jones in the Western Unitarian controversy of the 1880s. His lasting importance followed from two lengthy visits to India.

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Ballou, Hosea 2d

Hosea Ballou 2d
Hosea Ballou 2d

Hosea Ballou 2d (October 18, 1796-May 27, 1861), Universalist minister, scholar, educator, and journalist, was the grandnephew of the theologian and denominational leader Hosea Ballou. Ballou 2d played a crucial role defending the elder Ballou in the Restorationist controversy.

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Stout, Sir Robert

Sir Robert StoutSir Robert Stout (September 28, 1844-July 19, 1930), prominent New Zealand lawyer, politician, and educator, was his country’s Prime Minister and Chief Justice, and Chancellor of the University of New Zealand. He promoted liberal social legislation, including legal equality for women, and fought to keep the church out of public affairs and education.…

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Douglas, Paul

Paul Howard Douglas (March 26, 1892-September 24, 1976), a prominent Quaker and Unitarian United States Senator and economist, fought for civil rights, truth in lending, and conservation. By precept and example he promoted honesty and integrity in public office.

Born in Salem, Massachusetts, Paul was the younger son of James Howard and Annie Smith Douglas.…

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de Benneville, George

de Benneville Window, First UU Church, Reading, PA
de Benneville Window, First UU Church, Reading, PA

George de Benneville (July 26, 1703-March 19, 1793), a physician, was a universalist evangelist in Europe and an early advocate of the doctrine of universal salvation in the American colonies. He transmitted the heritage of German Pietist religious communities and the European Radical Reformation to a wider American public.

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Thomas, Abel Charles

Abel Charles Thomas
Abel Charles Thomas

Abel Charles Thomas (July 11, 1807-September 27, 1880) was a Universalist evangelist, minister, journalist, and historian. Although he served the Universalist church in Philadelphia in two separate pastorates totaling nearly twenty-five years and there wrote two of the most celebrated pieces of nineteenth-century Universalist controversial literature, he is most remembered for his short pastorate in Lowell, Massachusetts, where, as one of the founders and editor of the literary magazine, the Lowell Offering, he was a mentor to aspiring writers amongst the young women working in the textile mills.

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Sunderland, Eliza

Eliza Jane Read Sunderland
Eliza Jane Read Sunderland

Eliza Jane Read Sunderland (April 19, 1839-March 3, 1910), the wife of a prominent Unitarian minister, was a church leader, innovative religious educator, prominent reformer, and a popular lecturer. She was one of the first women in the United States to head a public secondary school and led the way for women who followed her to become professors at public Universities.

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Jacks, Lawrence Pearsall

Lawrence Pearsall Jacks
Lawrence Pearsall Jacks

Lawrence Pearsall Jacks (October 9, 1860-February 17, 1955), or L. P. Jacks, as he was always known, was probably the most widely known British Unitarian minister in both Britain and North America between 1914 and 1940. He was an educator, a prolific writer, and an interpreter of modern philosophy.

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Whitman, Bernard

Bernard Whitman
Bernard Whitman

Bernard Whitman (June 8, 1796-November 5, 1834), Unitarian minister, educator, apologist, and missionary, worked to spread Unitarianism beyond New England and the educated class. He brought Restorationists and other informally trained ministers into Unitarian fellowship.

Born in East Bridgewater, Massachusetts, Bernard was the thirteenth child of Deacon John Whitman.

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