RELIGIOUS:
The Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church was organized March 23, 1869. Its object is to engage and unite the efforts of Christian women in sending missionaries to the women in foreign mission fields of the church and in supporting them and the native Christian teachers, and all forms of work carried on by the society. It has collected and disbursed $5,454,700; sent to foreign fields 365 missionaries, and established a great educational work for women throughout the Orient. The first woman's college in Asia, at Lucknow, India, was founded by this society. It sent the first fully equipped medical woman to the mission fields of the East, and built the first hospitals for women in India, China and Korea. Nineteen hospitals and dispensaries are supported by the society, and 246 missionaries in Africa, Burmah, Bulgaria, China, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, South America and the Philippines, while twenty-four medical women are now in the field. There are 18,000 girls and women in its various schools.
The society has eleven branches, covering the whole United States, 5,410 auxiliaries, and 171,765 members. Mrs. Cyrus D. Foss is president.
The Woman's Home Missionary Society of the M. E. Church was organized July 10, 1880, to enlist and organize the efforts of Christian women in behalf of the needy and destitute women and children of all sections of the United States, without distinction of race, and to co-operate with the other societies and agencies of the church in educational and missionary work. The total receipts from July, 1880, to July, 1900, were $2,782,773; total value of property, $736,152. This property consists of twenty industrial homes and schools, six mission homes, two immigrant homes, three children's homes, six centers of city mission work, five deaconess and missionary training schools, twenty-eight deaconess homes, four rest homes for deaconesses and missionaries.
The Society has eighty-nine conferences, 2,500 auxiliary societies, 59,000 adult members and 13,500 children. The Deaconess Department was established in 1888. There are now (1901) 1,160 deaconesses with $1,600,000 invested in real estate connected with their work. Mrs. Clinton D. Fisk is president.
The Women's Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Protestant Church was organized Feb. 14, 1879, to bring the heathen to Christ. It has established schools, built churches and done a valuable work especially among girls. It has twenty branches and about 3,000 members. Mrs. F. A. Brown of Cardington, O., is serving her twenty-first year as president.
The Woman's Baptist Foreign Missionary Society was organized April 3, 1871. The leading object is the Christianization of women in foreign lands by furnishing support through the American Baptist Missionary Union to Christian women employed by said Union as missionaries, native teachers or Bible readers, together with the facilities needed for their work. Its missionaries have been sent to Burmah, Assam, India, China, Japan and Africa. The home constituency is found in the Baptist churches of the New England and Middle Atlantic States.
The total number of American missionaries supported for a longer or shorter time is 142. Of these seventy-eight are now connected with the society, 112 native Bible women employed as visitors in homes, and 367 boarding and day schools with more than 14,000 pupils are maintained. Many women who have been taught in these schools are exerting a strong influence as Christian wives, mothers and teachers. The medical missionaries have cared for souls and bodies alike. One of these doctors reports 17,000 treatments at her dispensary during the last year. Large sums of money have also been expended for mission work of various kinds under the care of the wives of missionaries. The total amount raised and expended in thirty years is over $2,000,000.
There are numerous auxiliary circles, including about 34,000 women, besides 10,000 younger women organized in guilds.
The Woman's Baptist Foreign Missionary Society of the West was organized May 9, 1871, for the elevation and Christianization of the women of foreign lands by furnishing support to Christian women employed as missionaries, to native teachers and to Bible women, together with the facilities needed for their work. It supports 177 schools, 5,337 pupils, 159 teachers and 94 Bible women. In the medical department it has two hospitals, two dispensaries, twenty medical students and three helpers; 597 patients were treated in the hospitals during the past year and 6,130 outside patients. The amount raised since organization is $885,279, and 105 missionaries have been sent out. There are 1,530 auxiliaries.