MISS CLAIRE GUNG
Born in Germany, became a Bahá’í in Torquay and later joined the small Bahá’í group in Cheltenham in 1940. She moved to Manchester and later pioneered to Northampton in November 1946 to become member of the first Spiritual Assembly there. In 1948 she again pioneered to help form the first Spiritual Assembly in the “Pivotal Centre” of Cardiff. In 1950, during the “Year of Respite”, Claire became the first pioneer actually to move from the British community to settle in Africa. Hailed by the Guardian as the “Mother of Africa” she worked for some years in Tanganyika and then moved to Uganda where she established a multi-racial kindergarten; she is still at her pioneer post at the time of writing (1979).
MRS. LIZZIE FOWLER HAINSWORTH
Became a Bahá’í in Bradford in 1946 after replying to her younger son Philip that she had not become a Bahá’í during his absence in the Armed Forces because “Nobody had asked me to”. She pioneered to Nottingham in 1946, to Oxford in 1949 and, at the age of 72, was the first believer in the British Isles to offer to pioneer in the Two Year Plan to Africa. (Convention 1950.) She died in Bradford in September 1951 before she could join her son Philip in Uganda. The Guardian wrote of her through his secretary, “She has truly shown an exemplary Bahá’í spirit in every way.... He wishes more of the Bahá’ís would arise to such heights of devotion and sacrifice.”
MISS MARGARET SULLIVAN (later MRS. MARGARET NELSON)
Pioneered to Dublin and was on the first Local Assembly there in 1948. She was Caretaker of the National Hazíratu’l-Quds, London from December 1970 to August 1976, and then became a founder member of the Tameside Assembly, Lancashire.