New Transcription: Toronto Monthly Meeting, 1893-1902 (B-2-47)

We’ve updated our transcriptions page with a new upload: Toronto Monthly Meeting (Orthodox) book from 1893-1902.

You can also see the PDF here: http://cfha.info/TorontoMMB-2-47.pdf

The Toronto Quaker Meeting continues to be an active meeting to this day. More about the history of the meeting can be found on the first page of the transcription.

The minutes themselves provide a wealth of information for researchers and genealogists alike. Visitors were welcomed and certificates of membership accepted from meetings in England (Newcastle, London, and Norwich), Ireland (Lisburn and Dublin), and across the United States (Kansas, New York, Iowa, and Indiana).

The following insight into the minutes has been provided by CFHA co-chair, Gordon Thompson:

The latest minute book to be transcribed is that of the Toronto Monthly Meeting (orthodox) 1893-1902. To readers familiar with transcriptions of the 1860s or earlier, the tone and shift in principles away from the primacy of the personal ‘inner light’ to one based on salvation and acknowledgement of sin will be jarring. This minute book commences a little more than ten years after the Orthodox/Conservative split, and it appears the Orthodox meeting continues to reverberate and rebound away from the traditional founding Quaker precepts. Researchers will find an abundance of family names and like references. Please note that this is the earliest minute book of any of the early Toronto meetings that is known to have been preserved and available for microfilming and transcription.

Our thanks and appreciation go out to Carman Foster once again for his transcription from images of the original text, and to Randy Saylor for researching and writing the detailed introductory notes. Thanks are also due to Jane Sweet, a member of the Toronto Monthly Meeting Library Committee, for tracking down Toronto Monthly Meeting library sources.

Friends’ Meeting House at 28 Pembroke St., Toronto. The Toronto Preparative Meeting purchased this meeting house in 1881 and it was in use until 1902. Photo is courtesy of the Toronto Public Library.