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Lake Erie Yearly Meeting Records
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Held at: Quaker Meeting Records at Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections and Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College [Contact Us]
This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Quaker Meeting Records at Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections and Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.
Overview and metadata sections
The Lake Erie Yearly Meeting opened on August 31, 1963, as an outgrowth of the Great Lakes Regional conference begun in May, 1939 and called Lake Erie Association of Friends Meetings after 1944. The Association began meeting annually on May 10, 1946 and continued meeting concurrently with the Yearly Meeting until August 23, 1969.
Records include minutes and other records of Lake Erie Association, Lake Erie Yearly Meeting, and its constituent quarterly and monthly meetings.
These records are organized into series according to Meeting:
- Lake Erie Yearly Meeting (Society of Friends)
- Akron Monthly Meeting (Society of Friends : Akron, Ohio)
- Ann Arbor Monthly Meeting (Society of Friends : Ann Arbor, Mich.)
- Birmingham Friends Meeting (Bloomfield Hills, Mich.)
- Broadmead Monthly Meeting (Toledo, Ohio)
- Cleveland Monthly Meeting (Society of Friends : Cleveland, Ohio)
- Detroit Friends Meeting (Detroit, Mich.)
- Grand Rapids Friends Meeting (Grand Rapids, Mich.)
- Granville Friends Meeting (Granville, Ohio)
- Green Pastures Quarterly Meeting (Society of Friends)
- Kalamazoo Friends Meeting (Kalamazoo, Mich.)
- Kent Friends Meeting (Portage County, Ohio)
- North Columbus Monthly Meeting (Columbus, Ohio)
- Oberlin Friends Meeting (Oberlin, Ohio)
- Pine River Friends Meeting (Mt. Pleasant, Mich.)
- Pittsburgh Monthly Meeting of Friends (Pittsburgh, Pa.)
- Red Cedar Friends Meeting (Lansing, Mich.)
- Wooster Friends Meeting (Wooster, Ohio)
Deposit, 19-[ongoing]
Organization
- Lake Erie Yearly Meeting (Society of Friends)
- Akron Monthly Meeting (Society of Friends : Akron, Ohio)
- Ann Arbor Monthly Meeting (Society of Friends : Ann Arbor, Mich.)
- Birmingham Friends Meeting (Bloomfield Hills, Mich.)
- Cleveland Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Cleveland, Ohio)
- Detroit Friends Meeting (Detroit, Mich.)
- Granville Friends Meeting (Granville, Ohio)
- Lake Erie Yearly Meeting (Society of Friends). Green Pastures Quarterly Meeting
- Kalamazoo Friends Meeting (Kalamazoo, Mich.)
- Oberlin Friends Meeting (Oberlin, Ohio)
- Pittsburgh Monthly Meeting of Friends (Pittsburgh, Pa.)
- Wooster Friends Meeting (Wooster, Ohio)
Subject
- Publisher
- Quaker Meeting Records at Haverford College Quaker & Special Collections and Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
- Finding Aid Author
- Inventory prepared by FHL Staff
- Finding Aid Date
- 2001
- Access Restrictions
-
Collection is open for research. Digital files are accessible to TriCollege accounts or on-campus users.
- Use Restrictions
-
Copyright has not been assigned to Friends Historical Library All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in to the Director. Permission for publication is given on behalf Friends Historical Library as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by reader.
Collection Inventory
Includes the Records of the Lake Erie Association
Files include minutes, programs and agendae, and attendee lists, with some gaps.
Physical Description3 folders
1 volume
Arranged chronologically: 1969, 1970, and 1971.
Physical Description3 folders
Arranged chronologically: 1974, 1975, and 1976.
Physical Description3 folders
bound volumes
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Some gaps.
Includes published manuals as well as some drafts.
Archive-It is a service that takes snapshots of websites on a scheduled basis to preserve access to past content. The Archive-It capture calendar for this website allows you to browse its content and design from various dates.
Akron Monthly Meeting in Summit County, Ohio was established on June 16, 1978. Before that, it was a preparative meeting from March 31, 1974, to June 6, 1978. It was possibly under Kent Monthly Meeting during this time period
Ann Arbor Monthly Meeting in Washtenaw County, Michigan, was established on January 18, 1938. Prior to that date, it was made a meeting for worship in 1935. Its two preparative meetings were East Lansing, from 1957 to before November, 1973, and Toledo, from 1958 to 1964
Physical Description5.5 linear ft.
United
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Missing 1939
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Lacking January and December 2023 and October and December 2024
Physical Description2 folders
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
2023 newsletter only includes January and February; news continues in the form of a weekly bulletin March - December 2023.
Physical Description2 folders
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Birmingham Monthly Meeting in Oakland County, Michigan, was established on September 21, 1968. It was a preparative meeting before 1960 under Detroit Monthly Meeting. It was made a meeting for worship in November of 1967
The file includes the initial correspondence by the Birmingham area Friends group requesting to become a Preparative Meeting under the care of Detroit Friends Meeting, as well as later reports from Birmingham Preparative to Detroit's monthly Meetings for Business.
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Arranged chronologically, foldered by year. Missing 1993-95.
Compiled into annual packets by Birmingham Meeting, the majority are photocopies or carbon copies of originals not deposited at Swarthmore. Includes a folder indicating "Pre 1972" archives that inventories records that are not on deposit at Swarthmore.
Earliest records are 1972-09 minutes. For most years, the packet of photocpies include a run of business minutes (occasionally with gaps), occasional newsletters (newsletters are also present separately in the Newsletters file), State of the Meeting reports, and meeting budgets. Sometimes additional records are included (statistical reports to the Yearly Meeting, Ministry & Counsel correspondence, LEYM mailings, draft resistance letters, occasional query responses or reports from affiliated meetings, etc.)
Physical Description23 folders
Broadmead became a monthly meeting in 1974. The Toledo Friends Group affiliated with it at its founding; it continues as a worship Group under Broadmead.
Records of Broadmead Monthly Meeting as well as the minutes and other records of Friends who wopshipped in Toledo, Ohio, mostly under the care of Broadmead.
Volume includes a list of Toledo Friends Group, 1941.
Toledo Friends Group became Toledo Preparative Meeting under Ann Arbor in 1958.
Some gaps.
Toledo Allowed Meeting for Worship became part of Broadmead Monthly Meeting in 1974.
Cleveland Monthly Meeting in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, was established on September 17, 1936. Before that date, it was established as Eldred Hall Meeting for Worship on April 2, 1925. Community Monthly Meeting merged with Cleveland Monthly Meeting in May, 1975. It has had two preparative meetings; Painesville from 1961 to November, 1966, and Berea from February, 1968 to the present.
Includes folders: 1959 7mo-1960 5mo, 1960 6mo-1961 6mo, 1961 6mo-1962 6mo, 1962 6mo-1963 6mo.
Arranged chronologically in folders: 1939-45, 1945-50, 1950-54, 1954-60, 1961-66, 1967-69, 1970-79.
Gaps.
Detroit Monthly Meeting in Wayne County, Michigan, was established on January 18, 1938. It began meeting for unprogrammed worship as the Detroit Association of Friends in 1924, having split off from the Detroit Friends Church (established in 1919 under the care of Muncie Montly Meeting). It is an active meeting.
Birmingham Preparative Meeting was included in it from 1958 until 1967, its records can be found in the Birmingham Friends Meeting series.
This file includes correspondence by and to L. Oscar Moon, who was minister of Friends' Church of Detroit when he left the meeting over sectarian differences. He requested a Certificate of Removal to Lansdowne Monthly Meeting, but ultimately joined other former Friends' Church Members in forming the Detroit Association of Friends, a then-independent meeting.
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Some folders of meeting minutes are by fiscal year and some by calendar yet.
Minutes are largely from monthly Meeting for Business as well as the Annual Meeting. Some minutes have been stapled into monthly business packets. This arrangement has been retained, so some months this file includes correspondence by members with other Quaker organization and Detroit organizations, as well as member-related correspondence. Minutes file also includes occasional State of the Meeting reports.
Physical Description16 folders
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Minutes file includes the monthly Meeting for Business minutes as well as Treasurer's Reports and occasionally memos from the Clerk to committees or similar correspondence to the full business meeting. They maintain the original arrangement by fiscal year, and were sometimes kept in reverse chronological order.
Digital minutes include meetings for business held remotely via zoom during the COVID-19 pandemic
Physical Description0.1 GB
3 folders
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Additional treasurer's reports for the 1990s and 2000s were maintained by the meeting in their minutes file, where the records remain.
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
These historical summaries were created by Kenneth Ives, meeting clerk, in 1959.
The first abstract is about the Detroit Friends Church, which was set up in 1919 under the care of Muncie Monthly Meeting (part of Indiana Yearly Meeting) and remained active until 1984. Excerpts from its minute book (now in the Earlham College Quaker collections) cover 1919-1926. The church, also called First Friends Church, split in 1924 with some members and its minister starting an independent unprogrammed meeting for worship "in the manner of Philadelphia" as the Detroit Association of Friends.
There are two summaries about the "Detroit Friends Meeting (FWC)" covering the 1920s and 1930s. Most of the records survive elsewhere in the collection, but the abstract narrates the origin and affiliation of what is now Detroit Friends Meeting, a constituent monthly of Lake Erie Yearly Meeting.
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Includes two typescripts, one by Carlisle Davidson (a member of Friends Church) and one unsigned, about William Savery and early Friends in Detroit. One typescript by Carlisle Davidson on "Anti-Slavery Activity of Hicksite Friends in Michigan, 1830-1860" and 1925-1926 clippings about Detroit Quaker meetings and weddings
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Includes committee minutes and a small file related to peace activist Alice Herz, who applied for membership to Detroit Friends Meeting in 1944. In 1951, the Committee of Overseers requested that she resign membership because of "the disturbances and disruption" that her calls to political action caused during meeting for worship.
SCPC-CDG-A-Herz, Alice Herz and Helga Herz Collected Papers
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
3 folders
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
2 folders
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Rebecca Shelley was a committed pacificst, although not a Quaker, who refused to take the citizenship oath to bear arms. The Meeting created a committee to support her in her repatriation claim.
Physical Description1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Reports file includes reports to Lake Erie Yearly Meeting (and occasional Green Pastures Quarterly Meeting), like annual statistical reports and special minutes to the YM. File also includes the minutes of Detroit Friends Meeting's Annual Meeting and annual reports from Committees, including Peace and Social Concerns, Ministry and Counsel, membership reports from the Recorder, and the Treasurer's Annual Report.
Physical Description7 folders
This file includes special minutes on meeting business, including venue rentals and grant applications, as well as activities important to the meeting, including minutes supporting the New Sanctuary Movement, protests against racial injustice, and "Becoming an Antiracist Faith Community."
Physical Description6 PDFs
4 folders
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Newsletter file for 1991-2011 has many gaps, particularly pre-2007.
Physical Description2 folders
47 PDF files
Grand Rapids Friends Meeting was established as a monthly meeting in 1971. There had been a worship group meeting since 1962, and prior to becoming a monthly meeting it was a preparative under care of Kalamazoo Monthly Meeting. The meeting remains active.
Records are retained by the meeting, the only material at the Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College are mailed newsletters.
1 folder (3 issues)
Granville Friends Meeting began as an informal meeting for worship in 1946, first in local homes and then in the College-Town House. In 1957 Granville was recognized as a monthly meeting under FWCC. In the 1960s the meeting membership declined, and the Meeting was laid down in 1966. Granville Worship Group was reformed in 1978 and by 1983 had assumed the responsibiliites of a monthly meeting, this time as part of Lake Erie Yearly Meeting. Participation again declined so by 1989 it was laid down, with three families continuing to gather for worship. The third reformation occured in June of 1993.
Physical Description1.25 linear ft.
1 volumes
1 folders
5 folders
18 folders
5 folders
4 folders
4 folders
1 folders
Green Pastures Quarterly Meeting, headquartered in Ann Arbor, Michigan, was incorporated on September 26, 1964. Its initial constituent Meetings and Worship Groups were the Ann Arbor Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, the Detroit Friends Meeting, the Kalamazoo Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, the East Lansing Preparative Friends Meeting, the Grand Rapids Friends Meeting (Preparative), and the Flint Area Worship Group. The quarterly meeting was established before September 28, 1957. It joined the FGC on June 28, 1960.
Kalamazoo Friends Meeting in Kalamazoo County, Michigan, was established on October 27, 1954. Grand Rapids Preparative Meeting was under its care from 1962 to 1971
Includes: Vol.1 1946-July 1961, Vol.2 Sept. 1961-April 1966, Vol.3 May 1966-March 1970, April 1970-April 1973, 1973 5mo-1977 5mo.
Physical Description2 vols. + 3 folders
Includes: 1977 5mo-1981 4mo, 1981 5mo-1985 4mo, May 1985-April 1990, May 1990-Dec. 1995, Jan. 1996-May 2000, May 2000-April 2005, May 2005-April 2010, May 2010-April 2011.
Physical Description8 folders
Minutes are filed by meeting fiscal year (May 1 - April 30)
Monthly newsletters filed by Kalazmazoo Friends Meeting fiscal year (May 1 - April 30)
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 folder
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Committee reports submitted at close of fiscal year (April 3) for the meeting. Includes both full State of the Meeting Report by the meeting clerk, as well as various committees (Pastoral Care, Peace and Social Action, Ministry and Worship, Library, etc.) and the fiscal year Treasurer's report.
Physical Description4 folders
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Written by Robert Friedmann, covering "The Beginnings" of 1946-1952
Physical Description1 folder
1 folder
This file inclues endorsements relative to a Travel Minute for meeting member Mey Hasbrook, who discerned with the Meeting that she was called by Spirit to travel in ministry.
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Kent Friends Meeting was established in 1965, and prior to that had been holding meetings for worship since 1960. The meeting is active.
1 folder (1 item)
North Columbus became a monthly meeting in 1938.
Meetings were held on the campus of Oberlin College as early as the 1930s, and Oberlin was affiliated with the American Friends Fellowship Council. The Meeting joined the Lake Erie Association and was one of the founding members of Lake Erie Yearly Meeting in 1963.
Bound meeting packets made by the clerk for Oberlin Monthly Meeting's fiscal years 2017-2020. Most of the packet is minutes of Meetings for Business, but they include member lists, statistical reports, and State of Meeting reports.
Physical Description1 folder
Material Specific DetailsUnited
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
10 PDF files
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
1 file
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Includes a member directory, the statistical response to LEYM, a 2023 Welcome Letter for attenders, and a letter to the new CEO of Kendal at Oberlin.
Physical Description5 files
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Includes a nominations list, a roles/responsibilities document for meeting leadership, and guidelines for worship leaders
Physical Description3 files
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Some gaps.
Includes responses to LEYM's query, FCNL priorities, and special minutes related to a demand for a ceasefire in Gaza and support for a pending Farm Bill.
Physical Description5 PDF files
Physical LocationFriends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Pine River Friends Meeting began as a worship group in 1967. It was set off as a monthly meeting by Green Pastures Quarter in 1970, and the monthly meeting was laid down in 2019. Friends in Pine River continue to meet as a worship group under care of Red Cedar Friends.
The minutes for 1971-1979 were recorded in a spiral notebook, with relevant material (treasurer's reports, state of the meeting, statistical surveys, etc.) laid in.
Physical Description8 folders
1 folder
1 folder
1 folder
A petition from Nancy Nagler, convenor of Pine River Friends, to Green Pastures Quarterly Meeting requesting monthly meeting status for Pine River. It was granted later that year.
Includes official correspondence from the meeting related to invited speakers in the area, membership correspondence, and a 2010 program celebrating the meeting's 40th anniversary.
Physical Description1 folder
Pittsburgh Monthly Meeting in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, was established on November 19, 1940. Previously, it had been made a meeting for worship in 1878. Its three preparative meetings were French Creek, from 1978 to 1983; Slippery Rock, in 1983; and Indiana [PA], in 1986
1 folder
1 volume (minutes 1955-1998) and 1 folder (records 1955-1957)
14 folders
8 folders
9 folders
In addition to minutes the files frequently include meeting annoucements and agenda, along with the relevant committee reports. The 2003-2004 file was kept as a running clerk's file by Debby Hollingshead (through July 2004), and includes member-related correspondence and other records.
Physical Description5 folders
An incomplete digital record of final meeting for business minutes, including committee reports. Begins with a May 2020 report from Archives describing the current and proposed workflow for meeting recordkeeping, with final approved minutes with corrections indicated starting in June 2020. File includes committee assignements. 2021 files include reports and presentations from the Treasurer and Finance Committee with budget proposals.
2018 special minutes include memorials and member appreciation as well as a minute responding to gun violence after the fall shootings in a Kentucky church and the nearby Tree of Life synagogue. 2021 special minutes include minutes of appreciation and a PYM minute on migration.
1 folder
File inclues some correspondence, meeting minutes, annual reports, and information including the official conveyance related to the purchase and resale of lots at Homewood Cemetery.
Physical Description1 folder
File includes committee notes and minutes plus other records produced during the special "meeting identity" Intermezzo discernment project led by the committee.
Physical Description1 folder
1 folder
Much of the file records campaigns and issues of interest to P&SC (interfaith work, school reform, etc.) as well as some records created by the committee.
Physical Description1 folder
1 folder
17 folders
16 folders
17 folders
Monthly newsletters include calendar, queries, draft minutes of the prior month's meeting for business, rotating columns and committee updates, and memorial minutes.
Physical Description87 PDFs in 7 folders
The Pittsburgh Quaker Community was a cooperative begun in 1971. PQC purchased its first home in 1972 and a second property, designated for intergenerational community living, in 1975. Both houses were sold in 1987 and the proceeds funded the Quaker Community Fund.
File includes Daniel Pierce's 1999 history based on interviews with early members/residents (Rodah Zarembka, Christine Wolfe, Walter Mead, etc.) and a 1999 reminiscence by Sue Beal.
Physical Description1 folder
Includes incorporation, by-laws, and trustee records for Pittsburgh Quaker Community as well as deeds, mortgages, and other legal documentation of the North Homewood Avenue and Meade Street properties
Physical Description2 folders
Includes a mix of legal documents (deeds, mortgages, etc.), correspondence, and minutes related to Pittsburgh Quaker Community, mostly from its early days in 1975/1976.
Physical Description2 folders
Darryl Phillips' clerk's file for Pittsburgh FM includes membership-related correspondence (resignations, applications for membership, etc.), memorial minutes, and correspondence to/from Pittsburgh and other meetings and Quaker groups.
Physical Description1 folder
Pittsburgh Monthly Meeting adopted its Discipline in 1949, with revisions in 1957, 1961, 1971, and 1993 (renamed Faith and Practice), and a 2007 update.
Physical Description2 folders
In 1968, Pittsburgh Friends Meeting led a local pilot project on newspaper advertising chaired by Stanley C Marshall. It was in coordination with Friends General Conference and their larger National Test Communications Program.
Physical Description1 folder
Lansing, Michigan was home to a regular Meeting for Worship by around 1942. East Lansing, as the meeting was first known, was established as a Preparative Meeting under care of Ann Arbor Monthly Meeting in 1951. They requested, and received, monthly meeting status in 1973 from Lake Erie Yearly Meeting.
East Lansing Monthly Meeting changed its name to Red Cedar Friends in 1978. The meeting remains active.
Red Cedar Friends records from 1990-2019 came in a single accession and maintain original order, including the meeting archivist's index of missing minutes and newsletters for each decade.
Physical Description1.65 linear ft.1 record carton and 1 document case