"It's Not My Job, It's My Life":

Howard and Anna Brinton's

Contribution to Twentieth Century Quaker Peace Activism

by Anthony Manousos

Paper prepared through the Gest Fellowship at Haverford College

and delivered as a talk at Pendle Hill on April 14, 2003

As directors and teachers at Pendle Hill for over twenty years, and as nurturers of Pacific Yearly Meeting, Howard and Anna Brinton played a significant role in the development of Quakerism in the Western as well as Eastern United States. They wrote numerous articles, pamphlets, and books that are still widely read today.1 They were also actively involved in the American Friends Service Committee from its early years after WW I through the 1960s. While they are best known as Quaker educators¾or as Dan Wilson called them somewhat grandiloquently, "translucent teachers and ministers of the Light"2 peace activism was a key element in their lives. Howard Brinton's writing on the historical basis of the Quaker Peace Testimony has become a classic. His views on the theological and spiritual underpinnings of Quaker social activism have also been profoundly influential. Through their work at Pendle Hill and the American Friends Service, the Brintons did a great deal to nurture the peace movement and helped to educate a generation of activists. This aspect of their lives deserves wider recognition and can help to deepen our understanding of how the Quaker peace movement developed during the twentieth century. Their life story exemplifies many of the challenges that peace activists had to confront during this past century of nationalism, totalitarianism, and global war.

This pamphlet will focus on three key periods in their lives: 1) their relief work in Europe for the AFSC after WWI, 2) their peace education work at Pendle Hill, and 3) ecumenical work and outreach to Asia after WWII. This study makes use of original sources, including interviews, letters, and an autobiography dictated by Howard Brinton that have never before been made public.3

Relief Work in Europe for the AFSC after WWI

Howard Brinton and Anna Cox both came from families deeply rooted in Quaker tradition and history, although from opposite sides of the continent and of the Quaker religious spectrum. During nearly fifty years of married life, they became involved in virtually every branch of Quakerism and somehow managed to harmonize profound differences in background, temperament, and theological perspectives. Trained in the sciences, Howard was introverted, scholarly, and mystical in temperament. Anna, on the other hand, was an activist and organizer as well as an academic; she also loved the visual arts and had a gift for drawing. Thomas Hamm once described Anna and Howard as the "most interesting Quaker couple since George Fox married Margaret Fell."4

Anna Cox Brinton was born in 1887 in San Jose, California, as Anna Shipley Cox. She was raised in the College Park Association of Friends, an independent Quaker organization which was started by her grandfather, Joel Bean, after he was disowned by Iowa Yearly Meeting following its takeover by evangelical Friends. This event had a profound impact on Anna as a little girl since she was also disowned, along with her family, when Iowa Yearly Meeting dropped her grandparents and members of College Park Meeting from its rolls. Anna was educated in California except for two years at Westtown School and one year in Europe (including trips to Greece and Rome), where she made the "grand tour" (Quaker style) with her outgoing "Aunt Kate" Shipley.5 Anna received her degrees, including the doctorate in classical languages and archeology, at Stanford University. After WWI, Anna went to Europe to do relief work for the American Friends Service Committee. There she met Howard Brinton.

Howard Brinton was born July 24, 1884, to a Quaker family in West Chester, Pennsylvania, whose roots went back almost three hundred years to the early settlement of Pennsylvania. The idyllic rural area along Brandywine River where Howard grew up is still called "Brinton country."6 Howard came from a "mixed marriage": his father was an Orthodox, and his mother a Hicksite, Friend. This may help account for Brinton's intense interest in bringing together the diverse strands of Quakerism. Howard went to Haverford College, studied with Quaker scholar/mystic Rufus Jones, and was graduated in 1904. He earned a Masters degree from Haverford in 1905 and taught at Friends Schools in Barnesville, Ohio, and at Pickering College (New Market, Ontario, Canada) from 1905-16. He earned a Masters in physics from Harvard University in 1909 and a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of California in 1925. His doctoral dissertation, The Mystic Will, explored the German mystic Jacob Boehme.7

Howard Brinton's peace and reconciliation work began when he was summoned to Guilford, a Quaker college in North Carolina, to help quell a "war" that had broken out on the campus in 1916. "War" was the word facetiously used by Greensboro Daily New [May 23, 1916] to describe an acrimonious conflict between the faculty and their new president, Thomas Newlin. Newlin made himself controversial by firing a popular dean and faculty member. Dissatisfaction with Newlin led to his being replaced by Brinton, who was seen as a "liberal" because of his association with Haverford College and Philadelphia Yearly Meeting.8

While this academic tempest in a teapot was brewing at Guilford, Europe was spiraling down into one of the most terrible wars of its history. While Brinton's primary concern as acting president of Guilford was to calm the troubled waters, raise funds, and keep the college afloat, he also took an interested in conscientious objectors (CO's) imprisoned for refusing to obey the draft. On June 18, 1918, he wrote a letter to J. Algernon Evans, describing a visit to Camp Jackson, where COs were being detained. During this period, CO's were often not allowed to communicate with those outside of prison, and even their names were sometimes hard to obtain. [One can't help thinking of the Muslims who were detained immediately following September 11, 2001.] Brinton was at first rebuffed by the captain in charge, but was finally able to "thaw him out" and acquire the names of Friends who were incarcerated. He was even allowed to exchange a few words with several of the men. The captain told Brinton that the men would be "sent to France to work in the fields where the bullets were flying" and "that would show whether they had a yellow streak or not."9 This experience no doubt had a strong impact on Brinton.

Soon after this prison visitation, Brinton applied to join the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), which was founded by Rufus Jones and other Friends to provide alternative service for conscientious objectors during WW I. Howard was not the only Brinton to be involved in post-war relief work, however. Howard's cousin, Walter Carroll Brinton, worked for the AFSC in France, where he died on December 8, 1918. Soon after arriving in Berlin, Howard went to the American cemetery in Romagne to visit his cousin's grave. Howard's brother Edward went to Germany in December of 1920 to work with AFSC child-feeding program in Germany.10

Howard Brinton began to work for the publicity department of the AFSC in 1919. He spent a year in the Philadelphia office before traveling to Europe in July of 1920. This experience proved to be a turning point in his life.

The fledgling AFSC office in Philadelphia described by Brinton is quite different from what it is today. Back in those days, there was a tiny administrative staff and a huge number of volunteers. As Brinton recalls:

The only persons occupying the office in Philadelphia were Wilbur Thomas, myself, and two or three secretaries... As we had at one time about five hundred men and women working in France, I was kept very busy with many undertakings.11

He traveled around the country trying to raise funds, but was not as successful as he had hoped. He was unable to convince German brewers in Chicago to donate money to the AFSC. He also had little luck convincing the Poles to contribute.

Returning "a sadder and wiser man" to his office in Philadelphia, Brinton asked to be sent to Germany to join the group that had gone to Germany to feed needy children. Brinton argued that he could be a more effective publicist if he was stationed in Germany rather than in Philadelphia, "as I would write better articles for news papers and magazines if I could see the situation myself." He was soon permitted to go for Europe.12

Robert Yarnall, who was acting head of AFSC, appointed Brinton as head of the Dresden office in Germany, which had the charge of feeding children in Saxony and Silicia. Brinton was glad for this opportunity. By this time, Anna Cox had arrived in Berlin and was engaged by British Friends to visit Berlin University and to arrange for feeding students that needed help. Howard and Anna became acquainted at this time.

Brinton went to Breslau, the capitol of Lower Silesia, the Southwest part of Germany, to join Anna, who was involved in the feeding program. There they fell in love and had a romantic interlude that led to their eventual marriage.13

In Upper Silesia, Howard had to deal with the chaos and instability caused by war. Like many relief workers, Howard learned that material aid and conflict resolution often went hand-in-hand. In the following letter, written Kattowitz, dated January 13th, 1921, Howard reveals that a sense of humor can be very helpful in dealing with a conflict situation:

[Upper Silesia] is the storm centre of Europe. We are all fervently hoping that the allies will soon permit the vote to be taken by which the people here shall decide whether it shall belong to Germany or Poland. Nothing of a permanent character can be undertaken her while the results are unknown. The Germans have developed the country into one of the greatest mining and industrial districts of Europe and German industry cannot live without its coal. But poor Poland is down and out and Upper Silesia could save her life and make her a real nation. So both sides are fighting hard to win [the plebiscite] and the large amounts of money poured into the country for propaganda purposes keeps the population stirred up and creates enmities amongst a people who wish to live in peace. There is a large French army of occupation and abundant police but much happens that reminds you of the wild and wooly West. Lots of it regular movie stuff. Here in Kattowitz the Clothing Commission has been replaced by an organization known as the "Unclothing Commission" which relieves you of your clothing right on the street but kindly offers you a signed receipt....

You can see where our troubles are in feeding children. Every committee must have the same number of Poles and Germans and they certainly watch each other. It is difficult not to do or say anything which might be considered unneutral. A number of our kitchens are right on the border and they give us the most trouble. If you should think we are not real peace makers over here just come with me to some committee meeting, not city or town but rather a parish, for here, as at home, small towns breed the hottest politics. When the two factions are unable to agree on some matter connected with the feeding, we are called in as umpires. It is a good policy first to let the Germans and Poles fire away at each other until their ammunition and temper is exhausted and then quietly remark that unless they find a way to cooperate the kitchen will be closed. They soon discover that they have been arguing over trifles and reconciliation is effected. We recommend this to the League of Nations as a good sample of the use of economic pressure to quell belligerency.14

The child feeding of Quakers had such a profound effect on Germans that it even affected their language, according to Brinton:

Stop a little boy on the street and ask him if he goes to the Amerikanische Kinderspeisung [American child feeding] and he will look at you blindly, but ask him "quakerst du" (do you quaker) and his face will light up. Quaker has become an every[day] part of speech. One child was heard not long ago to say that he was going to school "to eat a quaker."

Brinton saw that relief work was more than just feeding hungry bellies, however; it was also a matter of nurturing Quaker values needed by Europeans at this time:

To the European mind....Quakerism is ceasing to stop as the doctrine of a sect but rather spreads through unseen channels as a subtle influence permeating many movements and opposing the forces of disintegration and reaction.

Relief work also helped to dispel stereotypes created by war propaganda, as Brinton explains:

When one learns to know and love these simple kindly folk [in Upper Silesia], all that was said about the "blond beast" and the "atrocious Hun" seems like a bad dream too ridiculous to be true....The more we humans with all our common weaknesses learn to know each other, the more we discover how much alike we all are.15

During his period, Brinton witnessed first-hand the desperate plight of refugees and displaced persons. "The war has not only left Europe lame and broken," wrote Brinton, "it has left a Europe whose wounds are running sores, poisoning the whole body. The most distressing evidences that Europe is far from healed are the refugees, who can be found in every large centre of population, despairing, apathetic, homesick for the homes they will never see, without plans for the present, or hope for the future...."16

Brinton describes his visit to thriving camps set up by the Quakers to help refugees from Alsace Lorraine, where 120,000 had been forced to leave their homes by the French and were allowed to carry only 30 kilograms away (though many were too weak to carry even that much). Brinton visited two quaint villages, Lettgrenbrun and Villbach, where German soldiers had been quartered a year before, and where refugees were now under the care of "Herr Brenner" and the Quakers. With characteristic humor, Brinton describes the scene:

After dinner we went around to see the "Quaker cows," the "Quaker horses," and the "Quaker wagons," and various other useful articles sectarian and otherwise. The Quaker cows had Quaker calves but whether these were birthright or convinced members I did not inquire. I was introduced to many persons wearing "Quaker clothes" and I need hardly add that "Quaker clothes" in Lettgrenbrun does not refer to a broad brimmed hat and "plain coat." Some of it, truth to tell, looked rather worldly, but it clad the body with more than warmth, for it clad the soul also with love and sympathy; with the holy thought that some one in the world really cared.17

After his stint in Germany, Howard returned to the United States and married Anna Cox. They moved to Richmond, Indiana, where they both taught at Earlham College, and where their four children¾Edward, Joan, Lydia, and Catherine¾were born.

During the 1920s Howard continued to write articles and give talks on the subject of pacifism from a religious standpoint. One of his most intellectual efforts was an "Appeal to German Youth," which was later translated into English and published in the American Friend in the USA.18

In this essay, Brinton attempts to address the humiliation and despair that many young Germans felt after their defeat. He tells German students that one of Germany's greatest periods of literature and philosophy occurred after Napoleon had conquered their country. Brinton argues that the German idealists of the period were instrumental in saving humanity from eighteenth century rationalism and scientism.19

In Brinton's view, modern thinkers, especially psychologists such as Freud (whom he does not mention by name), had destroyed this German idealism and replaced it with a materialistic approach that dehumanizes human beings. Brinton was particularly appalled by the use of psychological techniques for war propaganda.

Brinton felt that scientists bore a burden of guilt for the unprecedented destruction wrought by modern warfare. He writes, "The war through which we have just passed, has shown that modern science, which we supposed was devised to further civilization, can be used to reduce man to a beast, and destroy what the years have built up."

Brinton concludes by observing that the spirit of service and idealism is desperately needed in the post-war world. "The world is in pain. Men have lost their way. Another war will bring a new age of darkness and yet every move of the diplomatists of Europe increases the probability of another such war."

Brinton's idealism was tinged with realism about human weakness. For this reason, he rejected the idea of inevitable historical or spiritual progress, an idea he associated both with Hegel and with his mentor Rufus Jones. According to John Cary, when asked what he thought of his Jones , Brinton replied: "He was too Hegelian."20 For Brinton, human progress could best be described in that old phrase: "two steps forward, one step backward." Having experienced first-hand the brutality of modern war, Brinton was far less optimistic than Rufus Jones and the idealists of his generation. Although Brinton was not as "disillusioned" as those of Jazz Age, he could to some extent understand and empathize with their "doubt and bewilderment."21

Brinton's experience during the war also made him impatient with Friends who sit on their laurels or take a passive approach to peacemaking. In a commencement address to the graduating students at Barnesville, Ohio, Brinton warned about the dangers of complacency during times of peace:

You are just old enough to remember how the great war came upon us and found us unprepared for the emergency. We had been thinking too much about traditions and not enough about the world around us. Finally we rallied from the shock and discovered that our peace testimony did not mean merely that we did not do certain things, it meant that we did do other things. We found our work in helping heal the wounds of war. Now that the number is growing who believe that only evil can came out of the war, we are patted on the back and told how wonderful we are. It is time for great humility. The truth is that since the stimulus of active relief work is removed, we are drifting back to our old negative attitude and peace means only that we don't fight, not that we are endeavoring to make a world where peace is possible.22

Brinton not only gave talks and wrote articles on the subject of pacifism and disarmament, he also took a controversial stand regarding two imprisoned labor activists. After their stint at Earlham College in Indiana, Howard and Anna moved to California to teach at Mills College, an elite women's college near San Francisco. They both became very active with California Friends, many of whom were concerned about Thomas Mooney and Warren Billings, labor organizers accused of planting a bomb during a San Francisco preparedness parade which left six dead and forty wounded in 1916. Howard, who was very sympathetic to the concerns of organized labor, became involved with this cause.

"Nothing in the history of [California] since the Civil War has so sharply divided people as the celebrated Mooney case," wrote Brinton in 1930. "For the past fourteen years, ever since the bomb explosion in San Francisco, the guilt or innocence of Tom Mooney and Warren, two aggressive Labor organizers, tried and sentenced to life imprisonment for this crime, has set the people of California into two mutually hostile camps....Friends believe that when any topic has become too hot for quiet and earnest discussion, something is wrong."23

Berkeley and Palo Alto Meeting appointed Brinton along with other Friends to meet Governor C.C. Young of California and call for the release of Mooney and Billings. "Friends have had long talks with Mooney," wrote Brinton. "Hours have been spent with him and never a word of ill word against those who have deprived him of so many years of freedom has been uttered.... If released, we believe that he will make a good and useful citizen of the state." The testimonial of Friends on behalf of these controversial prisoners had no initial effect, but both men were eventually released nine years later.24

For Brinton, social activism and mysticism were closely intertwined. "Friends who believe in and practice the mystic type of religion," wrote Brinton, "feel that earnest application of their principles will bring about a different state of mind."25

Brinton was also eager to apply "the mystic type of religion" to his educational work. To explore the possibilities of Quaker alternative education, he and Anna went to Woodbrooke in 1931 and were favorably impressed by what they saw. Woodbrooke is a Quaker adult study center started in England around the turn of the century to promote liberal Quaker thought. While in England, Brinton gave the Swarthmore Lecture on "Creative Worship" that made a positive impression on British Friends. When he returned to the United States, he was asked to be acting director of Pendle Hill, a Quaker study center started in 1929 and modeled after Woodbrooke. This turned out to be a major turning point in their lives, and in the development of twentieth century American Quakerism.

Peace Education at Pendle Hill

Pendle Hill was started at a difficult time (1929), but with great expectations for its future. Its first director was Henry Hodgkin (1877-1933), a Quaker missionary to China, peace activist, and one of the founders of the Fellowship of Reconciliation. A convert to the "Social Gospel," Hodgkin was deeply concerned with the social issues of his time as well as with the spread of authentic Christian principles. Summoned to the US by American Friends, he left China at age 58 and became Pendle Hill's first director in 1930. In two years he placed his personal stamp on what he called a "haven of rest, a school of the prophets, a laboratory of ideas, a fellowship of cooperation." Because of ill health, he didn't last long in his position, however. He died on March 26, 1933, in a Dublin, Ireland, Nursing Home.26 But he left behind a legacy of bold inquiry into social issues. The results of Henry Hodgkin's first course at Pendle Hill was published as Seeing Ourselves Through Russia; a book for private and group study (New York: R. Long and R.R. Smith, 1932).

Brinton became acting director of Pendle Hill in 1934 while still employed as a professor at Mills College. Two years later he and Anna became co-directors. At this time Pendle Hill was a struggling institution with only a handful of students. It took tremendous faith and courage for Howard and Anna to leave the comforts of their tenured academic life and move to Pendle Hill. Living conditions at Pendle Hill were relatively primitive. Funds were scarce. Future prospects uncertain. The directors not only had to teach, they also had to raise funds, recruit students and faculty, and even do chores, like cooking, changing the beds, and taking care of the plumbing. Students also participated in these tasks as part of their educational and spiritual discipline since there was not supposed to be a sharp line drawn between students and staff.

Pendle Hill was conceived by Brinton as a spiritual community that "seeks to heal the inward confusion that is so great a part of the world's outward confusion."27 It had qualities of a monastery, graduate school, think tank, and settlement house. While its primary purpose was to nurture contemplation and study, Brinton notes that "members are encouraged to undertake regular field work, often in connection with some local agency, provided this does not interfere with their main objective in coming to Pendle Hill." Opportunities for such field work were readily available in Chester, a nearby working class community.28

Situated in a tranquil rural setting, Pendle Hill became in many ways the Mecca of the American Quaker world. Clarence Pickett, the executive secretary of the American Friends Service Committee, lived on campus during the 1940s and 50s. AFSC volunteers and staff frequently came to PH for training and debriefing. 29 There was also a steady stream of lecturers, visitors, and conference attendees at Pendle Hill then as there is today.30

Pendle Hill endeavored to help students balance social activism with inward spiritual development, a goal of Quakerism since its earliest days. Activists would come to Pendle Hill for spiritual R and R, sometimes turning to pottery or gardening as a way of centering down. People going through life crises would go to Pendle Hill and find new direction and purpose for their lives. The goal was to help people to find inner peace and to become involved in social betterment.

Brinton quotes the familiar line of William Penn to explain Pendle Hill involvement in progressive political causes, such as the labor movement: "True godliness does not turn men out of the world but enables them to live better in it and excites their endeavors to mend it." Classes were offered in such "radical" subjects as labor relations and cooperative ventures.

Impending war had a significant impact on the Pendle Hill course of study. During the Brintons' second year as directors at Pendle Hill (1937-1938), the focus was on "two major inquiries (A) The Function of Religion in Social Change and (B) The Problem of War and its Solution." According to Brinton, "these two subjects represent the inner and outer aspects of a single problem¾how can a better social order be attained without resort to violence?"31

When war finally broke out in Europe, Pendle Hill became a haven for German Jewish refugees, Japanese who were brought in from West Coast detention camps, and exiles like the former German parliamentarian, F. Wilhelm Stollman, who had to flee his country after the Nazis took power.32 African American students were also welcome at Pendle Hill. For this reason, bigoted neighbors looked upon Pendle Hill with suspicion. According to Catharine Cary, daughter of Anna and Howard, a cross was once burned in front of their home at Upmeads, and yellow paint was often splattered onto Pendle Hill buildings (to indicate that Quakers had a "yellow streak"). The quiet, peacemaking work of Pendle Hill continued, nonetheless. Catharine recalls that Pendle Hill's gardener was elderly Japanese gentleman named Mr. Hasagawa who used to wear an old War World I army uniform (complete with puttees) to do his gardening work. When a couple of American soldiers wanted to learn Japanese in order to help with the reconstruction effort after World War II, they came to Pendle Hill to study Japanese with Mr. Hasagawa and his wife. Even though soldiers in uniform were an unusual sight on this Quaker campus, they were made to feel welcome.

Pacifist Writings

The idea for Pendle Hill pamphlets emerged through a suggestion made in 1933 by Douglas Steere during a lecture on the Oxford Movement.33 This led to the publication of a series of "tracts for the times" called "Pendle Hill pamphlets" that addressed pressing contemporary spiritual and political issues. These tracts also promoted the "Pendle Hill idea," particularly pacifism, simplicity, and Quaker worship.

"Friends believed that their pacifism followed so naturally and inevitably from their other more fundamental principles that little is said about it in early Quaker writings," wrote Brinton.34 Although some might question how widespread pacifism was among early Friends, twentieth century Quakers certainly felt the need to articulate their pacifist principles. Early Pendle Hill pamphleteers included A.J. Muste (1885-67), who wrote "The World Task of Pacifism" (#13, 1941) and "War is the Enemy" (#15, 1942), and Richard Gregg, who wrote "Pacifist Program in Time of War" (#5, 1939) and "A Discipline for Non-Violence" (#11, 1941). But it was Brinton who articulated the theological basis for Quaker pacifism in a way that has had an enduring influence upon Friends.

Social conflict, in Brinton's view, was a sign of spiritual malaise. In his essay "A Religious Solution to the Social Problem" (PH #2, 1934) Brinton diagnosed the chief problem of his day as the inability of the individual to find a healthy relationship with his or her community. People are drawn either to excessive individualism (which glorifies the individual, isolates us from our community, and leaves us feeling spiritually empty and isolated) or to secular totalitarianism (which binds us to group consciousness and makes us prey to social control). In Brinton's view, people in modern secular society have lost their feeling of genuine connection with their community because they do not have a sense of something greater than the individual self. As a result, people lack a sense of inner worth and seek to find meaning and purpose in their lives by joining a secular cause, such as Communism or Fascism. Such causes end up stifling rather than fulfilling the individual's deepest needs and often lead to violence or war. The other extreme is renunciation of the world-going off to live in a monastery.

Brinton proposes a third alternative, a "religiously integrated" community of individuals who are bound together by a common experience of unity, and yet respect each other's individuality. In Brinton's view, Pendle Hill's goal was to create this kind of "religiously integrated group." Such a group would model how human beings could get along together by simplifying their lives and living together cooperatively.

Brinton wrote at great length, and with great seriousness, about the social problems of his day, but what made him such an effective teacher was his ability to mix seriousness with humor and creativity.

In an annual Christmas letter dated December 1939, beautifully drawn by Anna, a gifted calligrapher, Howard explains social development and "what makes men live together peaceably" with a light touch of humor. In rhyming couplets he describes the six stages of society: tribalism, liberalism, anarchism, utopianism, super-humanism, and "on earth as in heaven." Each stage is illustrated with a geometric design showing how human beings relate to each other on both a horizontal and vertical plane. At the bottom of the letter are Anna's drawings of various family members, each with his or her favorite pet. Anna is shown feeding her chickens, Mary and Martha; Howard is shown holding two rabbits and gazing fondly towards his family. This letter illustrates how the Brintons managed to integrate teaching, family life and the mission of Pendle Hill into a delightful and instructive whole.

As World War II broke out in Europe, Brinton began writing essays on pacifism which were collected into a Pendle Hill booklet called Critique by Eternity (1943). In this booklet, which was widely used in Quaker First Day Schools, Brinton lays out what have become the seminal ideas of Quaker peacemaking.

First, Brinton argues that isolationism and pacifism are polar opposites. The true pacifist is engaged with the world, and seeks to bring about a peaceful society by eliminating injustice. A pacifist is someone who has experienced inner peace, usually within the context of a supportive religious community, and then seeks to bring out peace in the world through the elimination of selfishness. The root cause of war is a sense of isolation that leads to barriers between people-borders, tariffs, armies, etc.

In "Why Are Quakers Pacifists?" Brinton uses an historical approach. He discusses the faith and practice of early Friends and observes that they did not write a lot about pacifism or the Peace Testimony because they were primarily concerned not with "right action in itself but a right inward state out of which right action will arise."35

In "Blitzkrieg and Pacifism" Brinton takes an approach that seems rooted in biology (Brinton frequently described Quaker process as "organic" as opposed to the "mechanical" approach to religion).36 According to Brinton, violence depends on quickness because its very nature is mechanical and self-destructive. Pacifism, on the other hand, works slowly because it is an organic process. "The pacifist therefore cannot depend on blitzkrieg methods," concludes Brinton:

He must abide the slowness of organic. An inanimate bomb reaches its goal swiftly, annihilating whatever is in its way. A living object is soft and pliant, slowly adjusting its environment to itself. It must always depend on small beginnings, germ cells which are perhaps invisible. The pacifist is not afraid of minute beginnings, aimed at the distant future. Violence works quickly, but in the realm of life results are never swift.37

These observations seem especially relevant today when proponents of American imperialism are using blitzkrieg methods to enforce their agenda upon the world. In Brinton's view, curing a violence-addicted society like ours will not be accomplished quickly through some kind of pacifist "wonder drug," but will require a slow, organic healing process.

Brinton was convinced that pacifism cannot succeed if it is based merely on facts, theories and intellectual concepts. True pacifism must be grounded in spiritual experience, and in a community where peace and reconciliation are practiced as a way of life. This "new pacifism," as Brinton termed it, also requires discipline and training, not unlike that of a soldier. "As on the drill ground soldiers acquire the habit of obedience," wrote Brinton, "so, in the discipline and collective experience of the meeting, worshippers become wonted to heed the Captain of their souls."38

Brinton's ideas about peacemaking have permeated Quaker thinking and still have relevance today. When the United States invaded Afghanistan in 2001, Friends General Conference reprinted a pamphlet based on Brinton's writing about the Peace Testimony that appeared in Friends for 300 Years.

Anna also wrote a work which made a significant contribution towards peace. In 1951, when fears about Communism and the Cold War were on the rise, and the paranoia level in the United States was almost as great as it is today, Anna wrote "Towards Undiscovered Ends," which examines the history of Friends' religious concern for Russia from the time of Peter the Great (who attended a Quaker Meeting in London) until 1951, when London Yearly Meeting sent a delegation of seven Friends to Moscow at the invitation of the Soviet Peace Committee.39 These British Friends met with Russians, worshipped at the Moscow Baptist church, and had fruitful dialogues that set the stage for future Quaker reconciliation work. Anna strongly supported their recommendation that we be open-minded in our conversations with the Soviets and acknowledge what is good as well as what is detrimental in the Communist system. She concluded that "Friends everywhere must dedicate themselves afresh to God's 'ministry of reconciliation in this gravely divided world.'"

Anna's pamphlet provided useful background information as well as encouragement to Friends who continued this work of reconciliation between the Soviet Union and the United States over the next forty years. The title, "Towards Undiscovered Ends," now seems prophetically apt. Summing up her vision of Quaker service, Anna concludes:

When need arises, [Friends] set aside the claim of home and business for special service, even though the results of their endeavor must for the time being remain as undiscovered ends. It is by such willing and cheerful witness to the Truth which is Eternal that the lifeblood of the Society of Friends is kept flowing. There may also be an important impact on humanity at large.

Who could foreseen the consequences of this visit by British Friends during the McCarthy period? Over the course of forty years, small groups of dedicated Friends, along with many others of like mind and heart, made such visits and help build trust between Americans and Russians. Gradually, the walls of fear began to crumble. Finally, in the 1980s, the force of such peacemaking became irresistible, even to politicians raised on Cold War ideology. Relations between the Soviet Union and the United States were normalized, and Eastern Europe became free, without a shot being fired. The Truth does indeed work slowly and organically, in mysterious and wonderful ways.40

Ecumenical Work and Outreach in Asia after WWII

The Brintons were always deeply interested in the art, philosophy and culture of Asia, which had also been part of the Pendle Hill approach since the days of Henry Hodgkin. To prepare himself for Pendle Hill, Howard Brinton went to China, Korea, and Japan in 1936, where he visited temples and monasteries and deepened his understanding of Buddhism and Confucianism. This trip was undertaken mainly to further his religious studies, but the shadow of war was already beginning to darken the skies of Asia. "At the Japanese Embassy [in China] a military company was practicing maneuvers and Japanese airplanes were circling about over head," recalled Howard. "My rickshaw puller told me that Japan was getting ready to attack China."41

Because of the work being done by Gandhi and by Friends in India, both Anna and Howard wanted to visit this part of Asia. A voyage to India was planned for 1939-40, but had to be postponed because of war conditions. After World War II, "way opened" (to use an old Quaker expression) for Anna to visit India and other parts of Asia under the auspices of the American Friends Committee. She was given the "spacious" title "Commissioner for Asia."

Setting out in April of 1946 , she circumnavigated the globe by way of Paris, Rome, and Cairo. She visited the Friends Service Unit in Benghal and saw the big house leased by the Friends Ambulance Unit in Calcutta. She also went to Delhi, flew over the "Hump" to Chungking, and spent three weeks in northern Hanon. Then she went to Peking and Shanghai, where she spent a month. Along the way, she visited and offered encouragement to various AFSC and Quaker projects. She returned home to Pendle Hill on July 23, the 25th anniversary of her marriage.42

In August of 1949, after sixteen years of service to Pendle Hill, Anna Brinton resigned as Administrative Director of Pendle Hill and took a job with the AFSC international relations program. Looking back over her experiences at Pendle Hill during the Great Depression and war-torn 1940s, she wrote:

Through this period many influences drew our thoughts to men in battle areas, prisoners of war, refugees, husbands absent in relief work or C.P.S. [Civilian Public Service] camps. Men and women were paroled to our care. Babies were born whose fathers first saw them after many months. We grew accustomed to anxiety, but even so, Pendle Hill remained like 'some radiant upper story of the world, detached from and independent of the dark stretches below.'43

Anna continued to serve on the AFSC Board of Directors (1938-52) and acted as vice chairman (1958-60 and 1962-65). Howard continued to serve as director at Pendle Hill until his retirement in 1952.

During this time, he was commissioned by Harpers to write a book about Quakerism for the celebration of the 300th anniversary of the founding of Quakerism by George Fox. Too busy to write at Pendle Hill, he went to the home of his son Ed in California and completed most of the writing in about three weeks. "I knew what I want[ed] to say in the book," recalled Brinton. "[So] it went very fast." The last chapter was written in the last week of December, 1951.44 This work, called Friends For Three Hundred Years, became a Quaker classic. It contains one of the best expositions of the Friends Peace Testimony ever written.

In his discussion of the Peace Testimony, Brinton took extraordinary pains to examine this concern in light of Christian doctrine. One reason that Brinton took this approach may be his involvement in the ecumenical movement. At this time, one of the pressing issues for Friends was whether or not to join the newly founded World Council of Churches. Anna and Howard both attended ecumenical gatherings in Amsterdam and elsewhere. One of their goals was to make sure that the pacifist element in Christianity be acknowledged.

. According to Brinton, many Protestants of the "Neo-Calvinist type," such as Karl Barth, believed that Christ's teachings on pacifism are an ideal unattainable by most people because we are sinners in a fallen world. This view became prevalent during WW II because Nazism seemed to be an embodiment of evil and opposing it seemed an ethical imperative to many Christians. Today many fundamentalist Christians feel this way about the threat of terrorism.

Friends take a different view, according to Brinton. Friends believe that we must try to live up to the measure of the light that has been revealed to us, including Christ's teaching that we "love our enemy." Even though human beings are not perfect, it is still possible to follow Christ's example to the best of our ability, as the Spirit leads us. "If Jesus was himself a pacifist, as even the Neo-Orthodox admit," writes Brinton, "we must be pacifists also if we obey his command to follow him."45

After considerable discussion, the World Council agreed that "war is contrary to the will of God. War as a method of settling disputes incompatible with the teaching and example of our Lord Jesus Christ. The part which war plays in our present international life is a sin against God and a degradation of man." Brinton proposed an additional "prophetic" statement: "The Church has always demanded freedom to obey God rather than man." This statement in support of civil disobedience was approved after a period of silent reflection.

Despite these strong statements of principle, some members of the Council still believed that war is sometimes a necessary choice for Christians as the "lesser of two evils." In his Autobiography, Brinton considers why the Council adopted strong pacifist position:

The belief of these bishops and others was that Christ was not a perfectionist and did not propose a perfectionist type of ethics. The Sermon on the Mount was too lofty to be followed, but it served as a valuable ideal, which, although never reached by sinful men, yet could always lead to higher levels of conduct. This making of a strong statement of ideals and not feeling the necessity to live up to it is in accordance with the philosophy of Reinhold Niebuhr.46

For Brinton, the Quaker approach to Christian ethics is best summed up in the rejoinder of Joseph Hoag, a nineteenth century peace advocate. When Hoag advocated the Quaker peace testimony in 1812, a member of the audience said, "Well, stranger, if all the world was of your mind I would turn and follow after." Hoag replied, "So then thou hast a mind to be the last man to be good. I have a mind to be one of the first and set the rest an example."47

The Brintons were always keen on showing how pacifism could work in the world. For that reason, after leaving Pendle Hill, Howard and Anna decided to go to Asia under the auspices of the American Friends Service Committee.

The Brintons' work in Asia before and after WWII can be understood on several levels. On one level, it simply reflected Howard's interest in Asian religion and Anna's interest in Asian culture and art. But at another level, it reflected the Quaker spirit of reconciliation since it meant reaching out to cultures that many people in the United States regarded with hostility and suspicion. The 1930s were an era in which popular culture depicted Asians, and particularly the Japanese, as the "yellow peril." Many conservative Christians saw Buddhism and Hinduism as pagan or worse; some still feel this way. To reach out to Asians in the 1930s, '40s, and '50s was not unlike reaching out to Muslims today.

It is also worth noting that prior to the 1930s, most Quaker interest in Asia stemmed from the work of missionaries. Just like other Christian groups, Quakers (particularly of the pastoral variety) went to Japan, China, and India primarily to propagate their faith, not necessarily to learn about the faith traditions of others.

In an article entitled "The Third Stage of Quaker Missions," Brinton wrote about the three stages of missionary work. In the first stage (the early days of Quakerism), Quaker missionaries who went out into the world to share the good news of their Quaker faith did so for a few years, as the Spirit led them, and then returned to their regular lives and employments. In the 19th and early 20th century, missionaries became "professionals" and made a lifelong commitment to work in another country. According to Brinton, the third stage of missionary work is akin to the first stage. People take off from their ordinary pursuits and travel in the ministry for a few years.48

In a sense, Anna and Howard were Quaker missionaries of this third stage. They did not travel to make converts, but to spread Quaker ideas, particularly about peace.

After World War II, Quakers reached out to Japan to help in the relief effort. Friends such Esther Rhodes, Elizabeth Vining and Floyd Schmoe were instrumental in these peace-building endeavors. Anna Brinton became involved with these relief efforts through her connection with the AFSC. During the post-war years she traveled to India as well as China and Japan on various AFSC assignments.

When Howard and Anna went to Japan in 1952-54, they went as representatives of the AFSC and Pendle Hill, but were not given assignments for any particular work.49 Upon their arrival, they were aided by Esther Rhoads, Head of the Friends Girls School of Tokyo, and successor to Elizabeth Vining as tutor to the Crown Prince of Japan.

Anna immediately became involved in the two relief centers run by Friends in Tokyo, Setagaya and Toyama Heights. Located in an old military barracks, Setagaya had been converted into housing for over a thousand families. The AFSC Neighborhood center at Toyama Heights was a child care center. Anna was not only a frequent visitor to these centers, she also traveled to Korea to support AFSC's program work there.

Because the Brintons had no set assignment, they felt free to do whatever they were led to do. Howard gave talks in various parts of Japan, drove a Studebaker donated by a Philadelphia Quaker, and acted as a chauffeur for visiting Friends (he was proud of the fact that unlike many others, he did not have any accidents). According to Howard, "the most important event in my stay [was engaging] Yuki Takahashi as my secretary, guide, and interpreter."50 She came from a Presbyterian background, became keenly interested in Quakerism after reading one of Brinton's pamphlets, and later translated Friends for Three Hundred Years into Japanese.

With the help of Yuki, Howard arranged five Pendle Hill "Institutes," as public lectures were often called in those days. "These were attended by Quakers and other friends in Japan," wrote Howard. "Some became Quakers because of these institutes." Each was attended by around 50 persons. "Pendle Hill collected money...to support this Institute and former Pendle Hill students in Japan helped.... to plan this conference."51

Most of these conferences focused on religious themes, but there was also a pacifist element. As Howard explained,

I went to Nagasaki at the invitation of a large church there. Later [its pastor] became a secretary of the international FOR. The church was full. I saw the effect effects of A Bomb. I was told that 500 medical students were killed in one building. The second story was removed from the first story by bomb. Paul Sekiya, a secretary of Tokyo FOR [Fellowship of Reconciliation] and a good Quaker, invited me to accompany him on a journey through Hokkaido and other parts of Japan to make speeches on pacifism. He acted as my interpreter.52

According to Howard, his "most important achievement in Japan was to assist a group of Nichiren monks to plan a world pacifist conference to beheld at eight major cities in Japan. These monks had been bomb pilots. Their experiences as bomber pilots made them pacifists. Their leader, Nichidatsu Fuji, had been in India and under the influence of Gandhi."53

Seven foreign Quakers attended this Buddhist-sponsored pacifist conference, but none of the Christian missionaries. "Although themselves pacifists," wrote Howard, "[these missionaries] apparently did not feel ready to work with Buddhists"54

Howard was not able to secure support from the American Friends Service Committee for this venture because "they feared too much Communist influence." The American embassy in Tokyo (no doubt under the influence of McCarthyism) had spread the word that the conference would be infiltrated by Communists. Brinton was apparently a bit too radical for the AFSC at this time!

In his first speech, Howard "tried to show that all the great religions in the world were pacifist at the beginning." His address was mimeographed and circulated widely. The fourth and final meeting was held at Hiroshima. There he and the Mexican Quaker Herberto Sein lived in a home built by Floyd Schmoe.55 A Friend from Washingon state, Schmoe given a medallion by the Japanese Emperor Hirohito for his work building homes in Hiroshima after the bombing; in 1996 he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Over 80,000 people attended the final gathering of the Buddhist Peace Conference and there was also an elaborate parade described in detail by Anna Brinton.

We marched with yellow robed priests from Ceylon. Some Indians wore business suits, others their Prince Alberts. The Japanese were in stiff brocade. Priest Fujii and his monks and nuns, all newly shorn the night before so that their pates were smooth as ostrich eggs, were clad in white with yellow mantles. Many were beating fan-shaped drums...The cadence of this refrain ["Hail to the Lotus of Perfect Truth"] ran through everything, greeting us on station platforms, giving a rhythm for our walking, and faintly or more loudly was heard at any hour of day or night...We were feasted, flowered, and photographed, and put up at the finest of Yamagata's Inns.... 56

Communists appeared only at the closing meeting in Tokyo, according to Brinton. There two of the Communists, a Canadian missionary and a Buddhist monk from Ceylon, attacked the US for using atomic weapons.

Interestingly, Howard also spoke out against the US use of atomic weapons and was congratulated by the Japanese.

"The Japanese had suffered so much that militarists were very unpopular and pacifists were welcome," recalled Howard.

The Brinton mission to Japan had a profound influence on the Japanese, as this letter from Japanese Friends makes clear:

We found in him that mien of a living faith, or unity of knowledge and practice, which we in the Orient put value on and feel akin to. His unswerving faith and sympathetic heart lurking in his free and open-minded way will long be remembered by those who have been close to him, as showing what Quakerism stands for as a way of life....We are calling to mind several occasions of the Pendle Hill Institute retreat with him and Anna Brinton as host and hostess, each of which was a beneficial experience to all who attended it...They seemed to show us by example that a few words were enough to convey the depths of faith and that it is not by mere words but by the inner-most function of Spirit that we are led to the knowledge of God.57

Kimiko Nunokawa, a Japanese fellow worker at Setagaya, paid tribute to Anna by writing a poem which included these lines:

We saw--very often--that

Your feet were carried to the sick children:

Your eyes were put on poor people

And a miracle of love was revealed there.58

*****

What can we learn from the Brintons' experience of peacemaking?

First, Quaker pacifism is not based upon intellectual concepts or an ideology. It springs from a religious concern, inwardly felt as a "leading of the Spirit."

Second, such leadings often involve reaching out to those who are seen by one's society as the enemy and building bridges of understanding.

Third, Quaker peace activism is not a profession or a career, but a way of life.

Anna Brinton summed up the main elements of Quaker mission/activism as follows:

These [missions] were in no sense career activities, they were a kind of volunteering carried on without the spur of reputation. Even to assess prospects of success or failure plays no real part in the effort. The important factor is obedience to an inward requirement clearly felt, and agreed to by one's fellow members. With this impetus, ordinary men and women have undertaken extraordinary missions.59

To illustrate the "Spiritual Basis of AFSC Work," Anna told the following anecdote: "Someone once asked a staff person at Pendle Hill if she liked her job, and the woman replied, 'It's not my job, it's my life.'"60

Through their writings and teachings Howard and Anna Brinton helped to clarify the spiritual, theological and historical basis for the Friends Peace Testimony. But it is in their lives that we see most vividly the Quaker spirit at work in the world. This Brinton legacy of peacemaking continues to be of enormous help and value as we struggle to find our own way as Quaker peacemakers in the 21st century.

Notes

1 Howard Brinton's Friends for 300 Years (written to commemorate the 300th anniversary of the founding of Quakerism) is currently the third best-selling book in the Pendle Hill bookstore, a major Quaker book distributor. Over 1,000 copies of this Quaker classic are sold yearly. Two other Brinton works are among Pendle Hill's top twenty best-selling publications. No other 20th century Quaker author circulates so widely, at least in Quaker circles. Friends For 300 Years has recently been reprinted, with an historical update and notes by Margaret Hope Bacon, under the title Friends for 350 Years (Pendle Hill: Wallingford, 2002).

2 Living in the Light: Some Quaker Pioneers of the 20th Century, Volume 1, in the U.S.A. Leonard S. Kenworthy, Editor. FGC, Kennett Square, PA, 1984, p. 41.

3 These documents are available at the Howard Haines Brinton and Anna Shipley Cox Papers, Quaker Manuscript Collection, Haverford College Library. Brinton's Autobiography was dictated to his second wife, Yuki Brinton, just prior to his death in 1973.

4 Earlham College: a History, 1847-1997, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997, p. 139.

5 See Eleanore Price Mather, Pendle Hill Pamphlet # 176, Anna Brinton: A Study in Quaker Character, 1971

6 See Howard Brinton, "The Brinton Country," Friends Journal, Feb. 11, 1956, p. 84. "The Brinton country is not a sharply defined area; it extends from the forks of the Brandywine to Chadd's Ford and the sources of the winding brooks which flow into our ancestral stream. The Brinton country contains today two Brinton mills, Brinton's island, Brinton's dam, Brinton's bridge, Brinton's run, Brinton's road, and Brinton's quarry. These are more or less accidental reminders of our former occupancy. They are of minor importance compared with the many Brinton homes. Others besides Brintons settled here, of course, but most of these others sooner or later married Brintons; so we claim them all." From an address given by Howard at a Brinton Family Reunion held to dedicate the restoration of the house built by William Britnon in 1704 in Chester (now Delaware) County. It should be added that Brinton country also now includes a Brinton shopping mall.

7 The Mystic Will: Based on a Study of the Philosophy of Jacob Boehme, New York: MacMillan, 1930.

8 See my article entitled "Guilford College, North Carolina Friends, and World War I" in The Southern Friend, summer 2003. Newlin and Brinton represent two opposite Quaker approaches to the war, the pastoral and the prophetic: Newlin went to work for the YMCA to bolster the morale of the troops and help them to become better Christians, while Brinton visited CO's in prison and did relief work for the AFSC.

9 Unpublished letter from the Howard Haines Brinton and Anna Shipley Cox Papers, Quaker Manuscript Collection, Haverford College Library.

10 Brinton Connections: A Newsletter of the Brinton Association of America, Vol 1, Issue 5, Winter 2002, p. 1.

11 Unpublished autobiography from the Howard Haines Brinton and Anna Shipley Cox Papers, Quaker Manuscript Collection, Haverford College Library, p. 33.

12 Autobiography, p. 32.

13 This story has been told by Eleanore Price Mather from Anna's viewpoint in Pendle Hill Pamphlet # 176, Anna Brinton: A Study in Quaker Character, 1971. Howard's side of the story is told in his unpublished Autobiography.

14 Letter from Kattowitz,, dated January 13th, 1921, from the Howard Haines Brinton and Anna Shipley Cox Papers, Quaker Manuscript Collection, Haverford College Library.

15 Unpublished letter from Kattowitz, dated January 13th, 1921, op. cit.

16 Unpublished article entitled "A New Intervention in Upper Silesia," March 25, 1921, from the Howard Haines Brinton and Anna Shipley Cox Papers, Quaker Manuscript Collection, Haverford College Library.

17 Ibid.

18 American Friend, Seventh Month 7, 1921, p 533.

19 Op. cit., p. 534. Brinton writes that Kant's great achievement was to use "the critical methods of the new science which threatened to destroy humanity's faith in itself to build up that faith anew on a surer basis"

20 John Cary, a German professor at Haverford College, who is married to Brinton's daughter Catharine.

21 In "Quakerism and Progress," Brinton wrote: "Through science we proclaim a god-like control over Nature and through science we reduce ourselves to the very nature we seek to control. The man of today is a pitiable figure. Driven back on himself because he has lost his material goods, he looks into his soul and finds its empty. It is an age of doubt and bewilderment" (Friends Intelligencer, Sixth Month 11, 1932, p. 439)). Brinton argues that "my study of the evolutionary process has led me that we can go forward only by occasionally going backward." This meant returning to a simpler, more "organic" way off life associated with Quakerism.

22 Delivered 6th mo. 4th, Olney Currrent, 1926?, pp. 16-22. Translated into German and reprinted in the German Quaker newsletter, Mittelungen fur die Freunde des Quakertums in Deutschland, January 1926. From the Howard Haines Brinton and Anna Shipley Cox Papers, Quaker Manuscript Collection, Haverford College Library.

23 Friends Bulletin, May 1930, quoted in A Western Quaker Reader, edited by Anthony Manousos, Whittier, CA: Friends Bulletin Corporation, 2000, p. 24. This cause of Moody and Billings is reminiscent of today's Native American activist Leonard Peltier or African American activist, Mumia Abu Jamal, who are still incarcerated and have a large following.

24 After Mooney was pardoned in 1939, he went on tour briefly under labor auspices. He spent his last years in St. Luke's hospital in San Francisco, suffering from bleeding ulcers.

25 Friends Bulletin, op. cit. 24.

26 Tall (six-foot-five), athletic offspring of an old Quaker family in Northeast England, Hodgkin began his career as an evangelical Friend. A turning point in Hodgkin's life came when he made friends with the Kaiser's chaplain at the onset of World War I and they swore eternal friendship. When Hodgkin wrote a paper defending pacifism for a Lambeth conference of Christians and it was rejected, he decided to form a group called the Fellowship of Reconciliation in 1914. Thus began his career as peace activist. For a good brief biography of Hodgkin, see Kenworthy's Living in the Light.

27 The Pendle Hill Idea, PH Pamphlet #55, 1951, centerfold.

28 Ibid, p 17.

29 Henry Cadbury said, "For my own part, I always regarded the Service Committee and Pendle Hill as the obverse and reverse of the same good currency of American Quakerism" (Ibid, p. 47).

30 Ibid, p 17.

31 Pendle Hill Bulletin, Number 13, January 1937.

32 Sollmann (1892-1973) was a German pacifist, one fo the founders of the German republic, and one of the first members of Parliament to be attacked by storm troopers. He fled Germany and discovered Quakerism at Woodbrooke. He emigrated to the USA, lectured widely, and joined the Pdnel Hill staff in 1937. See "Religion and Politics" (Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill Pamphlet #14, 1941) and Zwischen Krieg und Friden von W.F. Sollman. Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill, 1948.

33 Mather, p. 19.

34 Friends for 350 Years, Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill Publication, 2002, p. 196. Margaret Bacon in her note observes that "the expectation that members was probably less common in the seventeenth century than here stated" (p. 287).

35 Critique by Eternity, Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill, 1943, p. 21.

36 Brinton's ideas here may also have been influenced by Taoism and by the mystical works of Jacob Boehme, who was the subject of Brinton's doctoral dissertation.

37 Op. cit., p. 19.

38 Op cit., p. 24.

39 Anna was also interested in the Doukhabors, a Russian sect that had affinities with the Quakers and were helped to migrate to Canada after being persecuted in Russia. When a radical segment of the Doukhabors began to resist violently Canadian government attempts to compel their children to attend school, Quakers were asked to help to resolve these conflicts. Anna Brinton went to Canada to help in this mediation process.

40 See my pamphlet "Spiritual Linkage with Russians: the Story of a Leading," Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill, 1992. In "How We Ended the Cold War" (The Nation, November, 1999) John Tierman counters the conventional wisdom among conservatives that the Cold War and Reagan's military buildup intimidated the Soviets or brought them to "exhaustion." He says what decisively influenced American as well as Soviet politicians was the growing numbers of people who became involved in the nuclear freeze movement and citizen diplomacy.

41 Autobiography, p. 77.

42Pendle Hill: A Quaker Experiment in Education & Community, by Eleanore Price Mather, Wallingford, PA: Pendle Hill, 1980, p. 48.

43 Pendle Hill Bulletin 98, 1950, quoted by Mather, op. cit, p. 55.

44 Autobiography, p. 96.

45 See Friends for 350 Years, p. 203.

46 Autobiography, p. 90.

47 Friends for 350 Years, pp. 196-197.

48 "The Third Stage of Quaker Missions," The Friends Intelligencer, Ninth Month 4, 1954, p. 488.

49 Autobiography, p. 99.

50 Autobiography, p. 99.

51 Ibid, p. 99.

52 Ibid, p. 100. Adherents of Nichidatsu Fuji's Buddhist sect, called Nipponzan Myohojo, have since built over fifty "peace pagodas" and continue to be active in peace marches and activities.

53 See Brinton's "World Pacifist Conference," Friends Intelligencer, Sixth Month 12, 1954.

54 "Buddhists, Quakers, Peace," by Howard Brinton, The Friend, Sixth Month 10, 1954, p. 416.

55 Autobiography, p. 102.

56 Mather, p. 32.

57 Autobiography, p. 105.

58 Quoted in Mather, Anna Brinton: A Study in Quaker Character, Pendle Hill Pamphlet # 176, p. 33.

59 "Towards Undiscovered Ends," op. cit., p. 4.

60 "The Spiritual Basis of AFSC Work," a symposium held at Friends Center in Philadelphia, PA, in 1963, taped and available through the AFSC Archives.