Friends Meetinghouse Interior

Artist's illustration of the Friends Meetinghouse, circa 1880.

National Park Service / Greg Harlin

Quick Facts

Location:

West Branch, Iowa

Significance:

Part of Herbert Hoover National Historic Site

Amenities

3 listed

Audio Description, Benches/Seating, Wheelchair Accessible

Worshippers sat on benches in “silent waiting” and spoke only when moved by an inner spirit. With the emphasis on individual worship, the meetinghouse had no pulpit or altar, no crucifixes or stained glass, nor an organ or a choir.

Partitions

Males and females sat on each side of an open partition, to encourage individual worship and full participation for women. The partitions were closed during the monthly meetings while membership business—marriages, deaths, births, new members, transfers, and disownment—was discussed. On the coal burning stoves, women heated soap stones which they used to warm their feet in cold weather.

Infants & Children

Infants and young children sat with their mothers. When infants disturbed the silence of the meeting their mothers took them to the nursery, or “cry room,” attached to the women’s side of the Meetinghouse. 

Facing Benches

Recorded ministers sat with elders and other respected members on the facing benches in the front of the building. Hulda Hoover, Herbert’s mother, was a recorded minister. 

"Strong Training in Patience"

“The long hours of meeting awaiting the spirit to move someone,” Hoover wrote, “may not have been recreation, but it was strong training in patience.” This training put to good use by a man who succeeded in business, fed millions in need, and presided over a nation in the early years of the Great Depression.

• Women in the Quaker Meeting

  
  

  When you walk into the meeting house, and you see the divided wall, and you understand that the women sat on one side and the men sat on the other, you wonder: Is this some kind of discriminatory practice among Friends? Actually, it was a very freeing thing.

  Credit / Author:

  NPS

  Date created:

  06/22/2010

  Audio Transcript

  Ruthie Tippin: “When you walk into the meeting house, and you see the divided wall, and you understand that the women sat on one side and the men sat on the other, you wonder: Is this some kind of discriminatory practice among Friends? Actually, it was a very freeing thing.” George Fox, founder of the Religious Society of Friends in 17th century England, was quite forward thinking about the role of women in the Quaker faith. Pastor Ruthie Tippin of the West Branch Friends Church reveals that in 1671, Fox requested that women have their own place to do business at their “monthly meetings.” It was during those meetings that the sliding wooden partitions dividing the room were pulled down. (sound effects: roller partition closing) Ruthie Tippin: (music) “The idea was to give women opportunities to learn how to lead, to learn how to clerk or chair a meeting, to take roles in leadership within their community. And oftentimes he had seen that men would take over those roles in mixed company, and it was better, he felt, for women to exercise those kinds of qualities on their own. And from that came this divided business meeting concept, and it flourished, and it strengthened women’s' voices; it strengthened women’s place in leadership, not only in the Friends church, but in all of life.” Hoover’s mother Hulda was one who did not hesitate to take on a leadership role within the meeting. She helped conduct revivals, founded and led a young people’s prayer meeting, and took an active role in prohibition campaigns. After her husband’s death, the thirty-two year old widow became even more focused on the two things that brought her joy: her children and her faith. Imagine the power of one voice echoing off the walls while everyone else sits in silence. Hulda spoke often in meeting, and over time, her testimonies and insights were not only welcomed and encouraged, but also formally acknowledged by the congregation’s elders.