Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Tracy Bee Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. Today we
Speaker 1: are going to talk about a religious figure. That's the
Speaker 1: Public Universal Friend, who described themselves as a genderless spirit
Speaker 1: sent by God to inhabit the resurrected body of a
Speaker 1: woman named Jemima Wilkinson. So the Friend has a clear
Speaker 1: place in the scope of lgbt Q or queer history,
Speaker 1: but the details of their story also mean that we
Speaker 1: need to handle their name and pronouns a little differently
Speaker 1: than we have done in other episodes of the show.
Speaker 1: We've generally tried to take our cues on names and
Speaker 1: pronouns from our subjects themselves, so sticking as much as
Speaker 1: we can to what they used in their own lives.
Speaker 1: And when we've talked about people who have experienced something
Speaker 1: that we might describe as a gender transition, even if
Speaker 1: the idea of transitioning had not really evolved yet, we've
Speaker 1: stuck to their post transition name and prodouns. The basic
Speaker 1: idea is that's who they were the whole time, even
Speaker 1: if that wasn't evident. To other people, and even if
Speaker 1: the subject's own understanding of their gender evolved over time,
Speaker 1: that doesn't exactly work for the public universal friend. Though,
Speaker 1: the friends sincerely believe that Jemima Wilkinson was a different
Speaker 1: living person who had died, and that God had chosen
Speaker 1: to send a genderless celestial being to dwell in Jemima's
Speaker 1: resurrected body, and that death and resurrection were centrally important
Speaker 1: to the friends religious identity and to the religious community
Speaker 1: they established. So in this case, it doesn't feel right
Speaker 1: to frame this episode with just one name instead of pronouns,
Speaker 1: because that wasn't really how the friend approached their own experience.
Speaker 1: The friend didn't answer to the name of Jemima Wilkinson,
Speaker 1: and we won't use that name when we're talking about
Speaker 1: the friend, But Jemima was still an important part of
Speaker 1: this story who we can't simply omit so to tell
Speaker 1: Jemima's story. Jemimah Wilkinson was born on November twenty nine,
Speaker 1: seventeen fifty two, and named after one of the daughters
Speaker 1: of Job. She was born in Cumberland, Rhode Island, in
Speaker 1: an area that had been part of a dispute between
Speaker 1: Rhode Island and Massachusetts. At one point it was considered
Speaker 1: part of the Massachusetts town of Attleboro. Jemima was the
Speaker 1: eighth child of Jeremiah and Amy Whipple Wilkinson, and the
Speaker 1: Wilkinson's had been living in that area for four generations.
Speaker 1: The Wilkinsons were related to several prominent Rhode Island families,
Speaker 1: including Stephen Hopkins, who was governor of Rhode Island Colony
Speaker 1: and later one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 1: Their farm was a successful one. Its main cash crop
Speaker 1: was cherries, and the family was so well known for
Speaker 1: these cherries that Jemima's father was nicknamed Cherry Wilkinson. Jemima
Speaker 1: had four more siblings that were born after she was
Speaker 1: and her mother died shortly after giving birth to the
Speaker 1: last of those children. Jemima was eleven or twelve, and
Speaker 1: her mother had at that point given birth to twelve
Speaker 1: children over the span of twenty five years. Jeremiah never
Speaker 1: remarried after his wife's death, and Jemima and her older
Speaker 1: sisters took part in raising their younger siblings. The details
Speaker 1: of her childhood and youth aren't that well documented. It's
Speaker 1: likely that she did physical labor on the farm, and
Speaker 1: we do know she became quite skilled at riding a horse.
Speaker 1: She was also described as an attractive young woman and
Speaker 1: a voracious reader with a sharp memory. She had very
Speaker 1: little formal education, but through self study she developed a
Speaker 1: deep knowledge of Quaker theology, particularly through the writings of
Speaker 1: figures like George Fox and William Penn. We also know
Speaker 1: that several members of the Wilkinson family had disagreement with
Speaker 1: the Smithfield Friends Meeting that led to their being disowned.
Speaker 1: Jemima grew up as tensions were escalating between Britain and
Speaker 1: its North American colonies. The colony of Rhode Island declared
Speaker 1: its independence two months before the rest of the colonies
Speaker 1: did on July four, seventeen seventy six. This situation put
Speaker 1: many Quaker patriotism at odds with their religious pacifism. Jemima's brothers, Benjamin,
Speaker 1: Stephen and Jepso were disowned from the Smithfield Meetings because
Speaker 1: they quote frequented trainings for military service and endeavored to
Speaker 1: justify the same. Jemima's sister Patients became pregnant in seventeen
Speaker 1: seventy six, but was not married, and she was disowned
Speaker 1: for this, Jemima ran afoul of the meeting standards as well.
Speaker 1: It's believed that she attended a Revival meeting held by
Speaker 1: George Whitefield also sometimes called George Whitfield during his last
Speaker 1: tour of New England in seventeen seventy, although her attendance
Speaker 1: isn't specifically documented at any of them. Sometime after that
Speaker 1: she started attending meetings of the New Light Baptists. Both
Speaker 1: the New Lights and the Quakers stressed individual enlightenment and
Speaker 1: conscience as part of their teachings, but the Quaker stressed
Speaker 1: the idea of discussion in consensus when it came to
Speaker 1: matters of theology and determining the scope of God's will.
Speaker 1: The New Lights, on the other hand, believed that everyone
Speaker 1: had equal access to God at any time. There was
Speaker 1: no need to discuss your conversion experience or your beliefs
Speaker 1: with anyone else or get their approval for them to
Speaker 1: be real and valid. In addition to attending these New
Speaker 1: Light meetings, that appears that Jemima was talking about the
Speaker 1: New Light teachings during her Quaker meetings. She was also
Speaker 1: refusing to use Quaker plain speech, which substituted THEE and
Speaker 1: thine in place of you and yours. The reasoning for
Speaker 1: this was that when the religious Society of Friends was
Speaker 1: being established, people used THEE and thine for close relations,
Speaker 1: but you and yours in a more formal context, including
Speaker 1: addressing royalty. This is very similar to the way that
Speaker 1: two versus zoo are used in French today. The Quakers
Speaker 1: believed in the equality of all people and used THEE
Speaker 1: and thine for everyone, regardless of rank, and continued speaking
Speaker 1: this way even as you became more common outside of
Speaker 1: Quaker communities as the prone down to use for everyone. Ironically,
Speaker 1: today the and nine sound very formal, but at the
Speaker 1: time they were thought of as the casual option. By
Speaker 1: the summer of seventeen seventy six, the Smithfield Friends had
Speaker 1: instructed Jemima to stop speaking out of turn. That may
Speaker 1: have also involved her speaking out about the disownment of
Speaker 1: her four siblings. She'd also been instructed to stop going
Speaker 1: to the New Light Baptist meetings. Jemima refused to do
Speaker 1: any of that, and then, like her siblings before her,
Speaker 1: she was disowned from the meeting in August of seventeen
Speaker 1: seventy six. There are two different accounts of what happened next.
Speaker 1: One is that Jemima threw herself into religious work, including
Speaker 1: ministering to and caring for the sick. The other is
Speaker 1: that she withdrew into her room and became increasingly isolated
Speaker 1: and morose. Either way, on October four, seventeen seventy six,
Speaker 1: she became seriously ill. An account that was tucked into
Speaker 1: the public Universal Friends Bible calls this illness a Columbus fever,
Speaker 1: described as a typhus outbreak that came from the Navy
Speaker 1: ship Columbus that docked in Providence, Rhode Island in seventeen
Speaker 1: seventy six. The Columbus definitely did dock in Providence, but
Speaker 1: it's less clear whether there was a typhus outbreak that
Speaker 1: spread from the ship. This same account reads quote on
Speaker 1: the fourth day of the tenth month, on the seventh
Speaker 1: day of the week, at night, a certain young woman
Speaker 1: known by the name of Jemima Wilkinson was seized with
Speaker 1: this mortal disease, and on the second day of her
Speaker 1: illness was rendered almost incapable of helping herself, and the
Speaker 1: fever continued to increase until the fifth day of the week.
Speaker 1: About midnight, she appeared to meet the shock of death.
Speaker 1: On October tenth, Jemima's family called for a doctor. This
Speaker 1: was doctor Man from neighboring Alborough, Massachusetts. Doctor Mann later
Speaker 1: wrote this account quote, her case was like one other.
Speaker 1: He knew of that the fever being translated to the head.
Speaker 1: She rose with different ideas that what she had when
Speaker 1: the fever was general role. And she conceived the idea
Speaker 1: that she had been dead and was raised up for
Speaker 1: extraordinary purposes and got well fast, but that she had
Speaker 1: been dead. None of her friends or attendants had any
Speaker 1: apprehension or thought of her having been dead, but she
Speaker 1: was for some time after considered by her friends not
Speaker 1: to be in her right mind. The friends account of
Speaker 1: what happened is quite different from doctor Mayne's, and we're
Speaker 1: going to get into that after we first paused for
Speaker 1: a sponsor break. As Holly said before the break, the
Speaker 1: public universal friends account of what happened in October of
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy six is quite different from the one by
Speaker 1: doctor Man that we read before the break. This account read,
Speaker 1: in part quote, the heavens were opened, and she saw
Speaker 1: too archangels descending from the east with golden crowns upon
Speaker 1: their heads, clothed in long white robes down to the feet,
Speaker 1: bringing a sealed pardon for the living God, and putting
Speaker 1: their trumpets to their mouth, proclaimed saying room, room, room,
Speaker 1: and the many mansions of eternal glory for thee and
Speaker 1: for everyone. Later in the same account, the Friend continued quote,
Speaker 1: the Spirit of Life from God had descended to Earth
Speaker 1: to warn a lost and guilty, perishing, dying world to
Speaker 1: flee from the wrath which is to come, and to
Speaker 1: give an invitation to the lost sheep of the House
Speaker 1: of Israel to come home, and was waiting to assume
Speaker 1: the body which God had prepared for the Spirit to
Speaker 1: dwell in. Some accounts have the word gossiping uh in
Speaker 1: place of the word perishing in that passage, possibly because
Speaker 1: of unclear handwriting. From this point the Friend stopped answering
Speaker 1: to the name Jemima Wilkinson and became known as the
Speaker 1: Public Universal Friend, as well as the All Friend and
Speaker 1: the Comforter, and a variety of other monikers. To followers,
Speaker 1: they were often just the Friend or the PuF the
Speaker 1: name Public Universal Friend, and also had some overlap with
Speaker 1: Quaker practices. Public Friends were the Quakers who were authorized
Speaker 1: to travel from place to place and preach. The Friends
Speaker 1: stopped recognizing the Wilkinson family as relatives, although several of
Speaker 1: the Wilkinson's were among the friends first adherents. Those adherents
Speaker 1: generally avoided using gendered pronouns or any pronouns at all
Speaker 1: when talking about the friend. This was true even in
Speaker 1: people's personal diaries or other private documents. Outside of those adherents, though,
Speaker 1: people were all over the place in terms of what
Speaker 1: pronouns and names that they used to talk about the friend,
Speaker 1: and this continues until today. Most biographies and journal articles
Speaker 1: use he or him or she and her. Tracy was
Speaker 1: telling me before we even started that a lot of
Speaker 1: the pieces she used as reference made this all very
Speaker 1: very confusing. Yeah, yeah, I think there was one article
Speaker 1: of everything that I read that used um, like a
Speaker 1: non gendered pronoun to talk about friend, and the rest
Speaker 1: of them a lot of them used she, and one
Speaker 1: entire book used heat, which I found jarring. Uh. The
Speaker 1: friend also started dressing in a way that combined masculine, feminine,
Speaker 1: and clerical apparel. Congregationalist ever styles described one outfit this way.
Speaker 1: Quote lightcloth cloak with a cape like a man's purple gown,
Speaker 1: long sleeves to wrist bands, man's shirt down to the hands,
Speaker 1: with neck band, purple handkerchief or neckcloth tied around the
Speaker 1: neck like a man's no cap, hair combed turned over
Speaker 1: and not long, wears a watchman's hat, and another account,
Speaker 1: Quaker missionary William Savory, described the friend wearing a calico surplus,
Speaker 1: which is a blousy liturgical garment. Others described the friend's
Speaker 1: appearance as being similar to depictions of Jesus Christ. The
Speaker 1: friend's voice was also described as neither masculine or feminine,
Speaker 1: or sometimes as both masculine and feminine, although some detractors
Speaker 1: described the voice as grum, which means morose, deep, or harsh,
Speaker 1: but also has connotations of sounding almost demonic. The friends
Speaker 1: first public sermon was delivered on October thirteenth, seventeen seventy six,
Speaker 1: so just three days after that doctor visit. They attended
Speaker 1: services at the Elder Miller Baptist meeting House and then
Speaker 1: afterwards spoke from under a tree outside the building. The
Speaker 1: friend continued to preach from the Wilkinson home and in
Speaker 1: the area around Cumberland, Rhode Island over the fall and
Speaker 1: winter of seventeen seventy six into seventeen seventy seven, and
Speaker 1: then set off as an itinerant minister in the early
Speaker 1: months of seventeen seventy seven. That year, Jeremiah Wilkinson was
Speaker 1: disowned from the Smithfield Quakers, and the three Wilkinson daughters
Speaker 1: who had not already been disowned, were all expelled in
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy nine, all of that for following the Friends teachings.
Speaker 1: The teachings were a fusion of Quaker and New Light
Speaker 1: Baptist ideas, along with some mysticism. Followers wrote about their
Speaker 1: prophetic dreams and their visions, and while the Friend was
Speaker 1: still in Rhode Island, faith healing was also part of
Speaker 1: their ministry, although that seemed to have disappeared after they
Speaker 1: moved on to other areas in the Northeast. The Friend
Speaker 1: preached on ideas of equality among all people, as well
Speaker 1: as being pacifist and abolitionist, and believed that women should
Speaker 1: obey God rather than men. The Friend also encouraged, but
Speaker 1: did not require, celibacy. These teachings also warned of a
Speaker 1: coming apocalypse to begin on April first, seventeen eighty. In
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy eight, the Friend felt called to take their
Speaker 1: preaching to England and made preparations to travel there, something
Speaker 1: that required a lot of work because the Revolutionary War
Speaker 1: was still going on. Although the Friend did get permission
Speaker 1: from local authorities to make this trip and started making
Speaker 1: arrangements for passage, the trip didn't actually wind up happening.
Speaker 1: One possible reason is that the Friend met and converted
Speaker 1: Judge William Potter. Potter was fifty seven at the time
Speaker 1: and was one of several prominent and wealthy people among
Speaker 1: the Friends followers. Potter's father had been one of the
Speaker 1: wealthiest planters in Narraganst at Rhode Island. Potter had inherited
Speaker 1: his father's estate and had become one of the most
Speaker 1: prominent men in that part of the colony. Potter had
Speaker 1: been an Anglican, but he and his wife Penelope, left
Speaker 1: the church to follow the public Universal Friend. The Potters
Speaker 1: became a major source of the Friend's financial support. The
Speaker 1: judge added a fourteen room extension onto his mansion for
Speaker 1: the Friend and their attendants to live in, and he
Speaker 1: housed the headquarters of the Friends community for six years.
Speaker 1: He also freed his enslaved workforce because of the friends
Speaker 1: abolitionist teaching. Towards the end of the seventeen seventies, Potter
Speaker 1: either lost or resigned from his position as a judge,
Speaker 1: as well as from other offices he had been holding.
Speaker 1: Either he stepped away from them all to focus on
Speaker 1: his work with the Friend, or he was voted out
Speaker 1: or lost his appointments because of these religious views that
Speaker 1: the Friend was teaching. From seventeen seventy eight to seventeen
Speaker 1: eighty seven, the Friend was primarily based in Rhode Island,
Speaker 1: although they traveled back and forth to other parts of
Speaker 1: New England, as well as farther south into New Jersey
Speaker 1: and Pennsylvania. The Friend established meeting houses in other cities
Speaker 1: and towns, including New Milford, Connecticut, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. By
Speaker 1: the early seventeen eighties, the Friends following had become known
Speaker 1: as the Society of Universal Friends. The Friends spent fourteen
Speaker 1: years as an itinerant minister, traveling from place to place,
Speaker 1: usually with between twelve and twenty followers. The Friend preached
Speaker 1: in exchange for shelter, also giving advice on things like
Speaker 1: domestic matters and farming, as well as mediating disputes they
Speaker 1: had visited and cared for POWs and injured soldiers on
Speaker 1: both sides of the Revolutionary War. The Friend had also
Speaker 1: actively recruited new followers, including attending the funerals of people
Speaker 1: of other faiths who had died, both to offer comfort
Speaker 1: to the bereaved and to be available for people who
Speaker 1: might be interested in their teachings but kind of reluctant
Speaker 1: to seek them out otherwise. By seventeen eighty three, though
Speaker 1: the Friend was being criticized in print beyond just articles
Speaker 1: that viewed their teachings as heretical or their gender as suspicious.
Speaker 1: That year, former adherent Abner Brownell published Enthusiastical Errors Transpired
Speaker 1: and Detected. It didn't specifically name the Friend, but it
Speaker 1: was clearly meant to be an expose of the Friends ministry.
Speaker 1: It may have been inspired by the writing titled A
Speaker 1: Brief account of a religious scheme taught and propagated by
Speaker 1: a number of Europeans who lately lived in a place
Speaker 1: called niski Una in the state of New York, but
Speaker 1: now residing in Harvard, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, commonly called Shaking Quakers.
Speaker 1: Again we always Love A very long and convoluted title uh.
Speaker 1: This particular piece of writing was an expose that was
Speaker 1: written by former Shaker Valentine Rathbun. Brownell seems to have
Speaker 1: been motivated to write this after the Friend excommunicated him
Speaker 1: for publishing his own book of prophecies without their permission.
Speaker 1: Among brown New's accusations was that the Friend maintained a
Speaker 1: spy network to pass them information about other people's sins
Speaker 1: in order to bring those transgressions up in front of
Speaker 1: the congregation during services. Brownell also said that the Friend
Speaker 1: had instructed him to plagiarize previous works by Isaac Pennington
Speaker 1: and William Sewell and published them as a book called
Speaker 1: Some Considerations Propounded to the Several sorts and Sects of
Speaker 1: Professor of this Age. This book had come out in
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy nine under the name A Universal Friend to
Speaker 1: All Mankind. It was definitely straight up plagiarized. In September
Speaker 1: of seventeen three, two members of the society drafted a
Speaker 1: declaration of faith in part to resolve ongoing questions about
Speaker 1: who the Friend actually was. Some of the friends adherents
Speaker 1: described the Friend as a Messiah UH or as a
Speaker 1: reincarnation of Jesus Christ, something that the Friend themselves never claimed,
Speaker 1: but also didn't really deny. This declaration described the Friend
Speaker 1: as quote the Council of the Lord, spoken by the
Speaker 1: influence of the Holy Spirit through the Tabernacle of the
Speaker 1: Universal Friend. In seventy four, the Universal Friends Advice to
Speaker 1: those of the same religious society recommended to be read
Speaker 1: in their public meetings for Divine Worship, was published. The
Speaker 1: Friend had established meeting houses in several communities at this point,
Speaker 1: and this book contained instructions on the structure of worship
Speaker 1: at those meeting houses, as well as lots of Bible
Speaker 1: verses and other quotations. According to the Universal Friends Advice,
Speaker 1: meetings were to begin punctually at ten in the morning,
Speaker 1: and people who couldn't attend meetings were advised to sit
Speaker 1: down in their homes at the scheduled time to quote,
Speaker 1: wait for and upon the Lord. Members were to live
Speaker 1: peaceably with all men as much as possible, or to
Speaker 1: take up your daily cross against all on godliness and
Speaker 1: worldly lusts, and to speak in meetings only when moved
Speaker 1: to do so by the Holy Spirit. The Friends Advice
Speaker 1: also included several references to the Golden Rule and the
Speaker 1: admonition to quote live as you would be willing to die.
Speaker 1: In five the Friend met Sarah Richards. After Richard's husband died.
Speaker 1: The following year, she joined the Society of Universal Friends,
Speaker 1: bringing her infant daughter, Eliza with her. Richards became one
Speaker 1: of the most prominent people in the society and the
Speaker 1: closest person to the public Universal Friend, essentially being second
Speaker 1: in the society's hierarchy and becoming known as Sarah Friend.
Speaker 1: A couple of years later, though, the society started to
Speaker 1: experience some troubles. On January four seven, several members of
Speaker 1: the Society were staying at the home of David Wagner
Speaker 1: in Philadelphia. There was some kind of argument between two
Speaker 1: of the friends adherents, Sarah Wilson and Abigail Dayton. Wilson
Speaker 1: later accused Dayton of trying to strangle her as she slept,
Speaker 1: something that other people in the house wrote off as
Speaker 1: a nightmare, but Wilson published an account of this whole
Speaker 1: incident that later morphed into the friend having tried to
Speaker 1: strangle her, even though the friend was in Rhode Island
Speaker 1: at the time. This happened. By the late seventeen eighties,
Speaker 1: the Friend was also facing increasing criticism and derision in
Speaker 1: New England. A lot of it was connected to the
Speaker 1: friends genderlessness and androgynous physical appearance. The tractors were inordinately
Speaker 1: focused on what kind of undergarments the Friend wore, what
Speaker 1: their voice sounded like, and whether there was something sexually
Speaker 1: licentious going on within the Society of Universal Friends, which,
Speaker 1: as we said earlier, encouraged celibacy. When the Friend established
Speaker 1: a meeting house in Philadelphia, it was almost immediately vandalized,
Speaker 1: which was the first time the Society of Universal Friends
Speaker 1: was the target of mob violence. Criticism and persecution were
Speaker 1: among the factors that led the Friend to establish a
Speaker 1: community in Western New York. The Friend may have also
Speaker 1: been inspired by a Frata cloister in Pennsylvania or New
Speaker 1: York Shaker communities, and we'll talk more about that after
Speaker 1: we pause for another sponsor break. When the Public Universal
Speaker 1: Friends selected a location for their community of followers, it
Speaker 1: was in a region that was being described as the
Speaker 1: unsettled frontier of the newly established United States of America.
Speaker 1: Of course, that was not true. What is now Western
Speaker 1: New York was home to the Seneca Nation, one of
Speaker 1: the six nations of the hoddanas Shone Confederacy. The friend
Speaker 1: was described as being fair and respectful with the Seneca
Speaker 1: people that they encountered, but we also only have white
Speaker 1: people's descriptions of this. The society's first community in New
Speaker 1: York was established in the Finger Lakes region, an area
Speaker 1: that was highly disputed Before the Revolutionary War, the colonies
Speaker 1: of New York and Massachusetts had argued over whose charter
Speaker 1: it belonged to. After the war, Britain wanted to claim
Speaker 1: it for the Loyalists and their former Hoddina Showny allies. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: the United States had tasked General John Sullivan with taking
Speaker 1: a scorched earth military campaign to punish the Hoddina Shown
Speaker 1: nations that had allied with the British. Although the New
Speaker 1: York Constitution forbade private purchases of land from indigenous nations,
Speaker 1: the New York Genesee Land Company, also known as the
Speaker 1: Lessie Company, had tried to get around this by securing
Speaker 1: a nine ninety nine year lease for it. Although the
Speaker 1: state ultimately invalidated that lease, the company had become so
Speaker 1: influential that the state had to then bring them on
Speaker 1: as negotiators when trying to get a clear title to
Speaker 1: this land from the indigenous population. So when the Society
Speaker 1: of Universal Friends started looking for land in seventive they
Speaker 1: definitely were not heading to a pristine, unsettled frontier. This was,
Speaker 1: as we said, highly disputed territory, and the society was
Speaker 1: benefiting from the systemic destruction of the Seneca Nation. The
Speaker 1: society's first settlement was on the western shore of Seneca Lake,
Speaker 1: with the first group arriving in Their goal was to
Speaker 1: live in a truly communal way, with all of the
Speaker 1: community's land being collectively held, but that idea turned out
Speaker 1: to be impractical, especially given all of these ongoing lease
Speaker 1: and tidal disputes over the land they were on. Instead,
Speaker 1: every member who contributed money towards the land acquisition was
Speaker 1: given a receipt what they're holding a portioned for use
Speaker 1: based on how much each person had invested, but all
Speaker 1: of the land was meant to belong to the community
Speaker 1: like There were no property lines around any person's individual
Speaker 1: plot of land. You could theoretically have the right to
Speaker 1: a certain percentage of it, but it wasn't defined as
Speaker 1: a specific piece of land in that parcel. Some of
Speaker 1: the eighties members returned to New England over the winter
Speaker 1: of seventeen eighty eight to seventeen eighty nine, and then
Speaker 1: came back to New York in the spring. The Universal
Speaker 1: Friend didn't join them until seventeen nine. They had planned
Speaker 1: to do so a year earlier, but nearly drowned in
Speaker 1: a carriage accident on the way. By this point, the
Speaker 1: Society of Universal Friends had grown dramatically, with new followers
Speaker 1: drawn in by the friends charismatic preaching. The seventeen nineties
Speaker 1: census recorded two hundred and sixty people living in the community,
Speaker 1: making it the largest white settlement in Western New York.
Speaker 1: They had also built a gristmill and a sawmill. A
Speaker 1: meeting house was finished in the summer of seventeen ninety
Speaker 1: as well. Many of the settlements households are actually headed
Speaker 1: by women, and there were, of course a large number
Speaker 1: of women among the Friends adherents. However, after this initial success,
Speaker 1: the settlement ran into a series of problems. In seventeen ninety,
Speaker 1: the federal government assumed state's debts from the Revolutionary War
Speaker 1: under the Funding Act of sevent The dispute between New
Speaker 1: York and Massachusetts about who owned Western New York had
Speaker 1: been settled with the Phelps and Gorham purchase of seventy eight,
Speaker 1: but after the Funding Act was passed, Massachusetts currency increased
Speaker 1: so much in value that Phelps and Gorham could no
Speaker 1: longer afford to pay for it. Land in the area
Speaker 1: changed hands repeatedly. Property value soared. The Society's land went
Speaker 1: from being worth two thousand, six hundred dollars to being
Speaker 1: worth eighty six thousand dollars, and whether the area was
Speaker 1: part of New York or Massachusetts was once again disputed
Speaker 1: in the fallout from the Funding Act, Yeah, Phelps and
Speaker 1: Gorham couldn't afford to pay for it. Massachusetts was like,
Speaker 1: we could take some of it back, then, great, give
Speaker 1: me it. Yeah. As all of this was going on,
Speaker 1: some of the Society's wealthiest investors decided that even though
Speaker 1: they had paid for this land on behalf of the community,
Speaker 1: they would take this opportunity to cash out on their
Speaker 1: investment and leave. It's led to a bitter bitter division
Speaker 1: between the community and some of its longtime members, as
Speaker 1: those with the most money arranged their sales without regard
Speaker 1: to who was living where or where. People had built homes,
Speaker 1: or planted orchards, or made other improvements Judge William Potter,
Speaker 1: for example, who we talked about earlier, made about forty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars profits selling land that other people were actually
Speaker 1: living on. As the Society lost control of the land
Speaker 1: on Seneca Lake, they moved once again in early seventeen
Speaker 1: ninety four, this time establishing New Jerusalem on the shores
Speaker 1: of Crooked Lake now called Cuca Lake. The Friend had
Speaker 1: started looking for land in seventeen ninety two, and this
Speaker 1: time the deed for fourteen hundred acres had been assigned
Speaker 1: to Sarah Richards, also known as Sarah Friend, since the
Speaker 1: public Universal Friend refused to do business under their legal
Speaker 1: name of record. Unfortunately, Sarah Friend died after a long
Speaker 1: illness on November see, and her will left the land
Speaker 1: to another prominent woman in the society, the Rachel Mallen.
Speaker 1: Once the Friend arrived in New Jerusalem in sevente they
Speaker 1: lived in a log cabin with the poorest members of
Speaker 1: the community, the ones who couldn't afford to build homes
Speaker 1: of their own. The Friend had also established what they
Speaker 1: called the Faithful Sisterhood. This was a group of women
Speaker 1: adherents who were the Friend's supports, circle and missionary force.
Speaker 1: Some of the Faithful Sisterhood also wore clothing that blended
Speaker 1: masculine and feminine elements and avoid using gendered pronouns for themselves.
Speaker 1: The Friend and the Society didn't escape legal and land
Speaker 1: troubles by moving to Cuga Lake, though. In seventeen ninety six,
Speaker 1: Eliza Richards, daughter of the late Sarah Richards, eloped with
Speaker 1: Rachel Mayland's younger brother, Enoch. Eliza was only sixteen and
Speaker 1: Enoch was not believed to be particularly cunning, so it
Speaker 1: is not clear if they came up with this whole
Speaker 1: idea on their own or if someone else put them
Speaker 1: up to it. They claimed Sarah's will had been tampered
Speaker 1: with and that Eliza had really inherited the Society's land
Speaker 1: from her mother, and that meant that upon her marriage
Speaker 1: to Enoch, the land was legally his. In May of
Speaker 1: sev Enoch filed an ejection action against the community. In
Speaker 1: the legal actions that followed went on until long after Eliza, Enoch,
Speaker 1: and the Friend had all died. Then, in seventeen ninety nine,
Speaker 1: James Parker, one of the investors who had sold his
Speaker 1: land for profit earlier on, brought charges of blasphemy against
Speaker 1: the Friend as part of an ongoing attack by several
Speaker 1: former adherents who really seemed set on just taking down
Speaker 1: their former religious leader. Judge Potter was also part of
Speaker 1: this whole effort. The Friend was questioned all these addies
Speaker 1: blasphemy charges in eighteen hundred. They didn't give a direct
Speaker 1: answer about whether they were the incarnation of Christ, but
Speaker 1: they flatly denied that they had tried to replicate any
Speaker 1: of Christ's miracles. The judge ultimately ruled that under the
Speaker 1: US Constitution, blasphemy was no longer an indictable offense, and
Speaker 1: the charges were ultimately dropped. The Friend gave up most
Speaker 1: of their public speaking and preaching after this, except for
Speaker 1: services held in New Jerusalem. In eighteen eighteen, the Friend
Speaker 1: wrote out a will which provided for the society's poorest
Speaker 1: members until the end of their lives. It had been
Speaker 1: signed public universal Friend, but on the advice of an attorney,
Speaker 1: the Friend had added the note be it remembered that,
Speaker 1: in order to remove all doubts of the do execution
Speaker 1: of the foregoing Will and Testament, being the person who,
Speaker 1: before the year one thousand, seven hundred and seventy seven
Speaker 1: was known and called by the name of Jemima Wilkinson,
Speaker 1: but since that time as the universal Friend. Yeah, their
Speaker 1: attorney was basically like, after all of this land dispute
Speaker 1: that we have had going on for so many years,
Speaker 1: please take this step to to make sure to like
Speaker 1: not give somebody else ammunition for saying that your will
Speaker 1: is not valid. On April nineteen, Patients Wilkinson Potter died
Speaker 1: and the Friend gave their last public sermon her funeral.
Speaker 1: The Friend died not long after, on July one, eight nineteen.
Speaker 1: Although the Society's death book used the words left time
Speaker 1: to mean died, the friends entry reads quote twenty five
Speaker 1: minutes past two on the clock. The Friend went from
Speaker 1: here after lying in state for four days so adherents
Speaker 1: could pay their respects. The Friend's body was buried in
Speaker 1: an unmarked grave. Court proceedings in the dispute over Sarah
Speaker 1: Richard's will went on until eighteen twenty eight. During that time,
Speaker 1: David Hudson wrote the first biography of the Friend. Hudson
Speaker 1: was a law partner of Robert W. Stoddard, who was
Speaker 1: representing Eliza and Enoch Mayland's children in the land dispute.
Speaker 1: Rather than being an accurate account, of the Friend's life.
Speaker 1: This was a libelous fiction meant to discredit the Friend
Speaker 1: and their community in court. Writing in the Quarterly Journal
Speaker 1: of the New York State Historical Association in nineteen thirty,
Speaker 1: Robert P. St. John described this biography as a quote
Speaker 1: and trustworthy narrative composed practically of sensational fiction. In the
Speaker 1: nineteen sixties, biographer Herbert Whisby wrote, quote, Hudson's book should
Speaker 1: be considered properly not as a biography of Jemima Wilkinson,
Speaker 1: but as part of the campaign to get her land
Speaker 1: by discrediting her aims and dispersing her followers. Unfortunately, the
Speaker 1: untruths and Hudson's book were then repeated in other sources
Speaker 1: over the years, and over time the most outlandish rumors
Speaker 1: and accusations became part of the lower surrounding the Friend.
Speaker 1: Under the terms of the Friends Will, the community's poorest
Speaker 1: members were, as we said, to be supported until the
Speaker 1: end of their lives. The last payments were made through
Speaker 1: a trust established by Rachel Maylan, with the final payment
Speaker 1: from the trust made in eighteen sixty two. The Friends
Speaker 1: Home in Jerusalem, New York is still standing today and
Speaker 1: it's listed on the National Register of Historic Places. UM.
Speaker 1: And before we move on to listener mail, I just
Speaker 1: wanted to shout out to my friend Adrial who read
Speaker 1: over the introduction and overall framing of this episode for me. UM,
Speaker 1: So thank you, Adrial. UM and I have listener mail
Speaker 1: that is pertinent to uh the land history in this story.
Speaker 1: It is from Melissa. Melissa says, high ladies. Firstly, I'm
Speaker 1: a big fan of your podcast. That has widened my
Speaker 1: perspective in so many important ways, not least of which
Speaker 1: it has changed history from being something that only happened
Speaker 1: to straight white men. We have all always been here.
Speaker 1: Your recent episode on the history of Hallmec, which was
Speaker 1: closely tied to the history of land grant schools, reminded
Speaker 1: me of a recent investigation that came out on where
Speaker 1: those land grants came from. UM and then Melissa provided
Speaker 1: a link to an article. I'm not sure if this
Speaker 1: came up with the research but was beyond the scope
Speaker 1: of the episode, but it did seem like the kind
Speaker 1: of perspective the podcast appreciates, so I thought you would
Speaker 1: find it interesting. The land grants and land grant schools
Speaker 1: consisted of land gained by coercive of at best and
Speaker 1: genocidal at worst, means at a fraction of a percent
Speaker 1: of its true value if it was paid for it.
Speaker 1: All the money obtained from the land grants and some
Speaker 1: of the land itself remains a sizable source of income
Speaker 1: for many of these schools. While Indigenous students, studies, and
Speaker 1: perspectives are routinely underrepresented, this is one of the times
Speaker 1: we can actually quantify the amount settlers have profited from
Speaker 1: taking from indigenous people's I thought this was especially important
Speaker 1: to point out in the context of the protests about
Speaker 1: police violence to black and brown people and the reactionary
Speaker 1: anger to people quote looting. There's a question of proportion
Speaker 1: of wrongs that needs to be kept in mind, as
Speaker 1: well as a historical lens. This continent and some of
Speaker 1: its most lauded institutions are the products of state sanctioned
Speaker 1: looting and continue to profit from it. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for all of your hard work putting out the podcast.
Speaker 1: It's been such a gift to consume. Melissa. Thank you
Speaker 1: Melissa for sending this email. UM I had not read
Speaker 1: the particular article that Melissa sent a link to, which
Speaker 1: is called land grab universities. It is in high Country news. Um.
Speaker 1: I didn't specifically say this in the episode because it's
Speaker 1: something that we've talked about so many times on the
Speaker 1: show that I sort of imagined it as a given
Speaker 1: anytime the federal government has been giving land to anybody,
Speaker 1: like that's indigenous land that the government took, like when
Speaker 1: we've talked about the Homestead Act, similar acts that granted
Speaker 1: people land, like this was Indigenous land that was at
Speaker 1: best coerced and at worst stolen or the product of
Speaker 1: mass murder. Um. But this article specifically traces like the
Speaker 1: actual land and which Indigenous communities have been living on
Speaker 1: that land. Um, Like they're interactive maps with all of
Speaker 1: the details. It is important, Like it's it's thorough information
Speaker 1: and important information. UM. And I am sorry for not
Speaker 1: specifically saying the part about like this land grant land
Speaker 1: being stolen land uh in the episode. UM, because I
Speaker 1: think Holly, you and I have both had this Uh.
Speaker 1: The trap is maybe not the word, but UM, we've
Speaker 1: both had the experience where we said something on the
Speaker 1: show enough times that we felt like we have said
Speaker 1: it already, we didn't necessarily say it. UM. So again,
Speaker 1: we don't have a great place on our website UM
Speaker 1: to share links anymore. Currently, I know there are still
Speaker 1: people who are very frustrated by that. The pandemic sort
Speaker 1: of up ended our plans to try to get a
Speaker 1: replacement like that. They're just other priorities right now, which
Speaker 1: I understand, but I also I'm frustrated by so again.
Speaker 1: This is called land grab universities. It's in High Country News,
Speaker 1: and it's got so much information about where specifically the
Speaker 1: land came from, who it used to, like, who used
Speaker 1: to live there. I don't want to say who it
Speaker 1: used to belong to because the idea of ownership does
Speaker 1: not necessarily work that way in all indigenous for many
Speaker 1: indigenous communities. UM. And then what schools benefited from that
Speaker 1: land and how? Uh Anyway, so thank you again Melissa
Speaker 1: for sending this email. UH if you would like, try
Speaker 1: to us about this or any other podcast for history
Speaker 1: podcasts at I heart radio dot com. We're also all
Speaker 1: over social media at missed in History. That's where you'll
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