Pennsylvania Conference

The Pennsylvania Conference is an administrative union of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the Columbia Union Conference.

Territory: Pennsylvania
Statistics (June 30, 2023): Churches, 115; membership, 13,633; population, 13,038,464.¹

Origins

The work of Seventh-day Adventists in Pennsylvania began as early as 1851, when Hiram Edson and J. N. Andrews in July went into Potter County and also Tioga County, adjoining it to the east.² They won a number of converts near what a report calls the “head waters of the Genesee, Allegheny, and Susquehanna rivers.”³ This seems to have been in the area of Ulysses, for at this place meetings of adherents were scheduled by Edson, Samuel W. Rhodes, and Joseph Bates, in 1851 and 1852. A church at Ulysses is mentioned in a report of meetings held by W. S. Ingraham in 1853 that drew six new members from among the Seventh Day Baptists. The Ulysses church was the scene of weekend “conferences” or “general meetings” from time to time—one of them in 1860 had about 100 Sabbath-keeping Adventists in attendance.⁴ Disbanded about 1865 “on account of removals,” it was reorganized with 18 members in 1867 and appears often in notices as late as 1879.

The Ulysses church in Potter County and the Mixtown church in Tioga County were incorporated into the New York Conference at its formation in 1862. By 1864 the conference was known as the New York and Pennsylvania Conference.⁵ In 1877 a church organized at Port Allegany was added to the conference and by 1879 a church with a Sabbath school membership of 30 to 40 members was well established in Sunderlinville.

Pennsylvania Conference (1879-1903)

In November 1878 the New York and Pennsylvania Conference voted to divide, and the Pennsylvania Conference began operation on January 1, 1879. Buel L. Whitney served as president of both conferences. The new conference included all of Pennsylvania and the New York counties of Chemung, Steuben, Allegany, Cattaraugus, and Chautauqua (the five counties were restored to the New York Conference by 1902). Pennsylvania Conference had 12 churches reporting 300 members by the end of its first year of operation.⁶

Eastern Pennsylvania. In 1880, J. W. Raymond and Frank Peabody held meetings in Lawrenceville, Tioga County, and won several people despite opposition from local ministers. Also in 1880, Isaac Sanborn won several people in eight meetings held at Fleetwood, Berks County. These meetings were held at the request of Amos Snyder, who had embraced SDA teachings in California some years before and, on his return, had won others to the observance of the Sabbath. This was apparently the group of German Sabbath-keepers in Berks County later visited by S. N. Haskell and B. L. Whitney in 1882. A church was organized in 1884 with 14 charter members. In that year new converts were added, and a tract society of 10 members was organized during tent meetings held by L. R. Conradi at Fleetwood. Five were baptized at Emaus (now Emmaus).

In August 1884 a city mission was opened in Philadelphia by J. M. Kutz and his wife, who distributed Signs of the Times and other periodicals. Frank Peabody joined them in September and gave Bible studies.

D. T. Fero preached at Roaring Branch in 1884, and the next year he organized a church of 29 members and a tract society of 15 members; the two Sabbath schools there had an aggregate membership of more than 50. In 1886 the work was further developed in Allentown by L. R. Conradi, assisted by J. S. Shrock, and tent meetings were held in Bethlehem, where Shrock led out.

In 1887, Frank Peabody and K. C. Russell held tent meetings in Round Top, Tioga County. In Williamsport, where interest grew rapidly, meetings were conducted by J. W. Raymond and J. E. Robinson. The next year E. W. Snyder was appointed to act as state agent in the interest of the canvassing work. At Reading, Shrock and Russell conducted meetings in both the German and English languages in 1888. Progress was slow, but a beginning was made. By October 1888 a new church building had been erected in Williamsport, and the church was organized in November with 24 charter members. Ellen White preached at a camp-meeting held in Williamsport in June 1889.⁷ In 1900 a church school was opened at Williamsport, reputedly the first in the Pennsylvania Conference, with the B. A. Wolcott husband-wife team as teachers.

The work was prospering in Philadelphia by 1900. This church, with a membership of 102, operated the Gospel Help Mission, which cared for 2,000 men and sold about 20,000 penny servings of food each month.

Western Pennsylvania. In 1883, I. N. Williams and J. G. Saunders organized a church in North Warren. At about the same time, work was being established in the Pittsburgh area.

By 1883 the Health and Temperance Association, with D. T. Fero as president, operated in Pittsburgh. About the beginning of 1885 a city mission was opened at 41 Frankstown Avenue, with a staff of four, and Frank Peabody as manager. During the first 10 months, three converts were won, and the lecture room had an average attendance of 10 nonmembers. During the fall of 1886, a church was organized in Pittsburgh with 21 charter members. About this time J. E. Robinson was conducting work east of Pittsburgh in New Enterprise, Bedford County.

After tent meetings were held in Altoona in 1894, K. C. Russell organized a church there. In 1889 J. W. Raymond organized a church at Albion, west of Erie, and by 1897 a church was organized in Erie. In 1899 C. S. Longacre preached in Greensburg, 30 miles (48 kilometers) east of Pittsburgh, with the help of Lee S. Wheeler, and organized a church there. By that time Adventist churches were located in most areas of western Pennsylvania.

East Pennsylvania Conference (1903-1963)

By 1902 Pennsylvania Conference membership had grown to 1,420 in 59 churches, with 110 Sabbath schools.⁸ It became part of the Atlantic Union Conference when the union was organized in 1901. In 1903, Pennsylvania was divided to form the Eastern Pennsylvania and the Western Pennsylvania conferences, their territories demarcated by a line that ran along the eastern boundaries of Potter, Clinton, Center, Mifflin, Huntingdon, and Fulton counties. The two conferences continued in the Atlantic Union until they transferred to the new Columbia Union Conference at its organization in 1907.

The division, voted in a conference session held at Kingston in June 1903, was thought desirable because of the problem of giving ministerial assistance to the widely scattered churches.⁹ Twenty-seven churches and about 800 members were assigned to the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference; R. A. Underwood was the first president. The conference headquarters moved from Williamsport to Philadelphia in 1904 and remained at various addresses until moving to Reading in 1951. The name of the conference was shortened to East Pennsylvania in 1920.

At the conference session in 1904 the Philadelphia Sanitarium, which had been opened by Dr. A. J. Reed in 1902, became a conference institution under the auspices of a newly-created Medical Department.¹⁰ The sanitarium prospered, graduating its first class of four nurses on July 5, 1906.

The German church in Philadelphia was organized in March 1907. Meetings had been held there at different times by L. R. Conradi, J. H. Schilling, and O. F. Schwedrat. The first church property was purchased by this congregation in 1909. There were also many German-speaking people who became Adventists in other parts of the conference.

In September 1910, T. H. Branch of Denver, Colorado, arrived in Philadelphia to begin work among the Black population. With the cooperation of the Black members of the North Philadelphia church, a church called the First African Seventh-day Adventist Church of Philadelphia was organized on February 11, 1911, with 16 charter members. Later renamed Ebenezer, its membership reached close to 300 by the early 1940s. It also became the base for evangelistic efforts that led to the planting of churches in Harrisburg, Norristown, and Elmwood. These four congregations were transferred to the Allegheny Conference when it was organized in December 1944.¹¹

In 1925 the Allentown church secured substantial airtime on radio station WCBA. Friday evenings were dedicated to Bible stories for the children and the International Sunday school lesson. Vesper services were broadcast at 5:00 on Sunday afternoons, and at 7:00, H. A. Vandeman presented a sermon.¹² As far as any record can be found, this was the first radio work done in eastern Pennsylvania.

The Italian work began in 1925 when an evangelist named Robino rented a hall in the Italian section of Philadelphia and held lectures. A church of 13 members was organized in 1929 after an evangelistic effort led by Elder R. Calderone.¹³ In 1963, there were 88 Italian-speaking members in Philadelphia.

East Pennsylvania Conference membership increased from 800 members and 24 churches in 1903 to 4,601 members and 62 churches in 1963. During these decades the conference also developed facilities to further support its mission. In June 1928, the Emmanuel Grove campground, near Wescosville, was purchased for $7,300 to provide a permanent campsite. Improvements included a large pavilion, a dormitory, a dining room, a cafeteria, an office and store, and 41 cinder-block cabins. More acreage was purchased from time to time. The conference headquarters, moved to Reading from Philadelphia, were housed in a two-story stone mansion purchased in April 1951 for $35,000.

Blue Mountain Academy in Hamburg, a secondary school opened in 1955, would represent an investment of almost $3 million. Both the academy and Camp Keystone, which has served youth, church, and camp meeting needs, are located on the property, comprising in all 725 acres (300 hectares).

West Pennsylvania Conference (1903-1963)

The Western Pennsylvania Conference began operation in June 1903 with E. J. Dryer as the first president. The new conference had 32 churches and 750 members, no medical institutions or church schools, and a heavy debt inherited from the Tract and Missionary Society. The working force consisted of six ministers and two Bible instructors. In 1907 the Western Pennsylvania Conference changed its name to West Pennsylvania Conference.

The years 1903 to 1910 were lean years financially for the conference, especially because of a financial depression in 1908 and 1909 that closed many steel mills and coal mines. The conference president, F. D. Wagner, reported: “When the mines closed, the church treasurer had little use to open the books.”

Although a school had been operated in Erie for a short time around 1898, the first church school in the West Pennsylvania Conference as such was opened in 1906 at Indiana, Pennsylvania, by J. W. Watt. By 1908 it had 16 pupils and a newly erected school building. At the conference session held in Oil City, June 18 to 28, 1908, a resolution was passed calling upon every member to donate two cents a week to a church school fund to assist new church schools. By 1909 two schools were in operation, with an enrollment of 28.

During the summer of 1903, when Sunday blue laws were agitated in Pittsburgh, C. S. Longacre took advantage of the aroused interest by holding a series of meetings that added a large company of converts to the church in that city. A second church was organized in Pittsburgh on January 21, 1906, as a result of W. H. Green’s work on behalf of the city’s Black population.¹⁴ By 1915 there were four churches in the city with a combined membership of 191. In 1951 three Pittsburgh churches with a total membership of 480 were combined as the Shadyside church. This new congregation purchased a former Methodist church.

Work also was conducted among foreign language groups in the conference. A nine-week evangelistic campaign in German was conducted by Charles A. Scholl and George West in a 30’ x 50’ (9 m. x 15 m.) tent in Allegheny (a suburb of Pittsburgh) in the summer of 1908. The five or six converts won at this time later developed into a German-speaking church. A Swedish church was organized at Mount Jewett in 1917 and a Slovakian church in Pittsburgh in 1939.

The Black work thrived at the Pittsburgh No. 2 congregation, which took the name Ethnan Temple in 1924.¹⁵ The West Pennsylvania Conference membership was reduced by 318 when that church and a much smaller one in Uniontown were transferred to the new Allegheny Conference in December 1944.

The conference office was located at Corydon, Pennsylvania, from 1904 until 1910 when it was moved to Pittsburgh, on Mount Vernon Street. In 1918 it was moved to Indiana, Pennsylvania, then back to Pittsburgh in 1920, then to Greensburg in 1922, where it occupied three different addresses. Then in 1940 the office was again moved to Pittsburgh.

A youth campsite was purchased in 1954 a few miles east of Punxsutawney, on which an artificial lake and several buildings were constructed, and the ministry of Laurel Lake Camp began. By 1961 the conference owned 34 church properties, including two junior academies (at Erie and Pittsburgh) and six church school buildings. When its 60-year history came to an end in 1963, the West Pennsylvania Conference had 2,397 members in 40 churches.

Pennsylvania Conference (1964 - )

In 1963, after 60 years of separation, the East and West Pennsylvania conferences were reunited. On January 1, 1964, the new Pennsylvania Conference began to function, with headquarters in Reading.

In 1971, the conference formed a lay advisory council whose function was to interpret and share the church’s intents, objectives, and concerns, provide communication between membership and leadership, and generate new ideas, plans, and creative approaches to the church’s problems and challenges.¹⁶ Under this council, a debt of nearly $250,000 was liquidated in eight months.

Also in 1971, a full 10-day camp meeting was reestablished, and a permanent location (at Blue Mountain Academy) was voted on at the triennial session in 1973. The Wescosville campground was sold in November 1970 for $102,596.25.

Evangelism¹⁷

The It Is Written telecast was launched in the Philadelphia area in 1972, in Pittsburgh in 1974, and in Erie and Scranton in January 1975. Radio programs of local origin and special Voice of Prophecy releases have touched many areas of Pennsylvania.

On September 12, 2015, “Faith for Family” was launched in Philadelphia and Reading. Over 1,300 believers, consisting of teachers, pastors, and students, converged on these two cities and shared more than one million pieces of literature about Jesus with people. As a result, 120 small groups were created, and more than 100 people gave their lives to Jesus and were baptized.

The following year, on October 1, 2016, over 1,300 believers from across Pennsylvania were deployed, this time to western Pennsylvania. Thousands of Bible study enrollment cards were mailed out to the community to start Bible studies. Bible workers were sent in advance to assist churches and start working in the community. Spiritual revival was reported in many of the churches. Then on October 14, 2017, in central Pennsylvania, over 1,800 church members/missionaries from across Pennsylvania and several other states participated in the Faith for Family mission project.

Faith for Family has continued on an annual basis, focusing on a specific region of the conference through 2019 and then in 2020, working simultaneously across the state. One key ingredient of Faith for Family was the work of Bible instructors in the local community. Each year part-time Bible instructors were hired and provided training. These men and women then worked to develop and follow through on Bible study interests in local communities where a Faith for Family evangelism series was to be held.

In 2019, the CORE School of Evangelism was launched. CORE is a discipleship program for young adults designed to strengthen the CORE of their Christian identity and Adventist belief and teach them how to effectively share the gospel with others. Prominent Adventist leaders teach courses on sharing Bible studies, literature evangelism, social media evangelism, health evangelism, organic agriculture, and overseas missions. Students learn both in the classroom and through hands-on experience.

In 2022, the Conference moved into a new facility at 2359 Mountain Road in Hamburg, repurposing a building on the campus of Blue Mountain Academy. The move was voted unanimously by constituents at their October 2020 session—the first Zoom constituency session in the North American Division. This new Mission and Evangelism Center is home to the CORE School of Evangelism and features an auditorium that is equipped for video production and live-streaming training and events.

The conference added a media ministries department in 2022, recognizing that video and social media are tools to reach people where they are, meet their needs, and lead them to Christ. Resources are being produced to equip churches and schools to reach their communities in this way.

Education

Blue Mountain Elementary School got its start in the fall of 1954 in a farmhouse known as Farm #5 close to the corner of Mountain View and Stone Roads. Six students, ranging from first grade to seventh grade, studied with Mrs. Gladys Lay. The 1955-1956 school year saw a move to a garage adjacent to Farm #4. The building was located closer to the newly opened academy at the corner of Academy and Mountain View Roads.

By 1961, the school had grown to 26 students, requiring two full-time teachers and a move into the academy’s facilities. Construction of a new facility began in 1967. Ray Kelly, manager of Harris Pine Mills and chair of the BME board, headed the building committee. On January 12, 1969, 43 students, Principal Mildred Wuchenich and teacher Edith Galambos moved into the new school building. Home and School fundraising efforts underwrote the addition of a multipurpose room in 1988. In 1992, a classroom addition increased the number of classrooms to five. Just before the start of the 2015-2016 school year, a tornado destroyed the building. No one was hurt, but for the remainder of that year and the next, the elementary school was again conducted on the Blue Mountain Academy campus. A new facility was completed in time for the start of the 2017-2018 school year.

Huntingdon Valley Christian Academy originated in 1969 as Greater Philadelphia Junior Academy. Prior to 1969, Hatboro Church School served the youth in the area. In May of 1998, the school changed its name to Huntingdon Valley Christian Academy to reflect its location and commitment more accurately to the community at large. It provides traditional classroom instruction in grades 1-11.

Mountain View Christian School dates back to 1895. The first teachers, Mr. and Mrs. B. A. Wolcott, taught in a building located at the corner of Heburn and 5th Street in Williamsport. Over the years the school met at different locations in both Williamsport and South Williamsport. Its name has changed several times over the years, including the Williamsport Church School and Mountain View Junior Academy. Pre-school and kindergarten were added in 2011.

In 1908, the Pocono Adventist Christian School (PACS) began offering Christian education to the Stroudsburg community. The school began before the church was even organized. PACS and the church share a building located at West Main Street in Stroudsburg.

Seventh-day Adventists in the Reading area recognized early the need for Christian education. The first Adventist church school started in 1898. However, after that year, the school was closed and not reopened until the 1914-1915 school year. Two Adventist schools operated in the immediate Reading area by 1928. Construction at the current location on Kenhorst Boulevard was completed in 1949.

The Wyoming Valley Seventh-day Adventist Elementary School was established in 1989 on 11.077 acres located between I-80 and Nauangola Road in Mountain Top, Pennsylvania. Prior to 1989, a church school was situated in the basement of the Kingston Church for many decades. In the late 1970s George Scott and several others were instrumental in arranging for the purchase of the tract of land where the Wyoming Valley school is presently located. After flooding in the Kingston Church in the late 1980s made it necessary to temporarily relocate the school to the Slocum church, building contractor Frank Kowalski spearheaded construction of the present school building. A gymnasium was added in the early 1990s.

In 1950 the York Seventh-day Adventist Christian Day School was established to provide Christ-centered Adventist education for the children of church members in York and Hanover. In August 2011, the school changed its name to York Adventist Christian School to reflect its commitment to the community more accurately.

Lehigh Valley Seventh-day Adventist School began in 1929 with nine students, located above a grocery store on South Sixth Street in Bethlehem. In 1932, the school grew to need two teachers and was moved to the Allentown Seventh-day Adventist Church building. The next move, in 1942, was to the basement of the Bethlehem Seventh-day Adventist Church at 16th Avenue and West Broad Street. On Memorial Day, 1965, the Bethlehem church and the school moved to the corner of Jacksonville and Macada Roads. When continued growth made a larger facility necessary, a new school was built at the present site, 3950 Mechanicsville Road in Whitehall, and opened in 1976. Two new classrooms were added in 2003 to make room for an increase in enrollment. In 2019, the school changed its name to Whitehall Christian School.

Publishing Work

Pennsylvania led the publishing work in the Columbia Union in 1969 and the North American Division in 1972 and 1973. In 1991, with the development of Family Enrichment Resources, the publishing work leadership moved out of the conference office.

In 2002, the Youth Department began a summer literature evangelism program for high school and college students, Pennsylvania Youth Challenge (PYC). The students earn income for school expenses while going door-to-door in communities across Pennsylvania, selling books, praying with people, and offering Bible studies. PYC has not only resulted in Bible studies that have led to baptisms but has prompted a number of the students participating to choose baptism themselves and a few to dedicate their lives to full-time gospel ministry.

The Pennsylvania Adventist Book Center (ABC) expanded its operations to include a bookmobile in 1969, which delivered supplies throughout the conference. A branch was dedicated and put into service at Blue Mountain Academy, also in 1969. The ABC Religious Books and Supplies and Nutrition Food Center in Reading was closed in April 1984 and moved to a new building on the Blue Mountain Academy campus. This move proved profitable as shown in the more than $1 million in sales in 1991 and 1992. Subsequently, however, sales took a downward turn, and despite several attempts to continue an ABC, the store was permanently closed in 2016.

Blue Mountain Academy opened the BMA Health Food Store in 2017 in the same location as the former ABC. It is operated by academy staff and students, with all profits going to support students.

Health Ministries

The Reading Institute of Rehabilitation was made a part of the Pennsylvania Conference on July 1, 1966, six years after the purchase of the 263-acre (110-hectare) Eberley Estate to establish the institution. In 1969 the institute became a member of the American Hospital Association. When it became evident that the mansion housing the institute was no longer adequate, a $3.5 million 80-bed hospital was constructed on the estate and opened on December 8, 1974. In 1979 a four-story wing was added for doctors’ offices, communication disorders, psychiatry, social services, and a warehouse. In May 1986, a head injury wing was dedicated. With the acceptance of 20 subacute rehabilitation beds the hospital was certified with a 100-patient capacity.

The rehab hospital was sold in 1998. Assets from the sale were used to start the Reading Institute for Better Living, which later became Adventist WholeHealth Network (AWHN) in 2002. AWHN serves as the health ministries department of the Pennsylvania Conference, working with local churches and schools and providing training, grants, and resources for community outreach. Services include health and wellness seminars, health screenings, training for congregational health ministries, bereavement support (grief support), spiritual care, faith-based community nursing, and yearly wellness camps.

Presidents

Pennsylvania Conference (1879-1903): B. L. Whitney, 1879-1883; D. B. Oviatt, 1883-1887; J. W. Raymond, 1887-1892; I. N. Williams, 1892-1895; R. A. Underwood, 1895-1897; I. N. Williams, 1897-1899; R. A. Underwood, 1899-1903.

East(ern) Pennsylvania Conference: R. A. Underwood, 1903-1904; W. J. Fitzgerald, 1904-1907; W. H. Heckman, 1907-1912; H.M.J. Richards, 1912-1917; D. A. Parsons, 1917-1920; J. A. Leland, 1920-1923; B. G. Wilkinson, 1923-1924; C. V. Leach, 1924-1928; C. S. Prout, 1928-1930; W. M. Robbins, 1930-1936; G. F. Eichman, 1936-1939; F. H. Robbins, 1939-1942; T. M. French, 1942-1943; L. H. King, 1943-1945; D. A. Ochs, 1945-1947; T. E. Unruh, 1947-1960; Arthur Kiesz, 1960-1963.

West(ern) Pennsylvania Conference: E. J. Dryer, 1903-1905; C. F. McVagh, 1905-1908; I. N. Williams (acting president), 1908; F. D. Wagner, 1908-1910; I. N. Williams (at first the vice president), 1910-1911; B. F. Kneeland, 1911-1913; R. A. Underwood, 1913-1914; F. H. Robbins, 1914-1918; I. D. Richardson, 1918-1919; R. S. Lindsay, 1919-1920; D. A. Parsons, 1920-1923; W. M. Robbins, 1923-1930; W. A. Nelson, 1930-1932; M. G. Conger, 1932-1938; L. H. King, 1938-1943; M. E. Loewen, 1943-1946; W. C. Moffett, 1946-1950; A. J. Robbins, 1950-1958; F. W. Wernick, 1958-1963.

Pennsylvania Conference (1964- ): D. W. Hunter, 1964-1966; O. D. Wright, 1966-1971; D. G. Reynolds, 1971-1976; W. A. Loveless, 1976-1978; G. Henderson, 1978-1982; F. Thomas, 1982-1985; G. Patterson, 1985-1987; J. N. Page, 1988-1994; M. Cauley, 1994-2003; R. Hartwell, 2003-2017; G. Gibbs, 2017- .

Sources

Annual Statistical Reports. General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists Online Archives (GCA). http://documents.adventistarchives.org/.

Canosa, Louis. “Lay Advisory Council Elects Officers For 1971.” Columbia Union Visitor, May 13, 1971.

“East Pennsylvania News Notes.” Columbia Union Visitor, July 18, 1929.

“Eastern Pennsylvania Conference.” Atlantic Union Gleaner, May 11, 1904.

Edson, Hiram. “From Bro. Edson.” ARH, September 2, 1851.

Fuller, N[athan]. “Meetings in Pa., and N. Y.” ARH, August 14, 1860.

Green, W. H. “Western Pennsylvania.” ARH, November 15, 1906.

“New York and Pennsylvania Conference.” ARH, December 5, 1878.

“New York and Pennsylvania State Conference.” ARH, September 12, 1865.

“New York Conference Report.” ARH, December 1, 1863.

Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia. 2^nd rev. edition. Hagerstown, MD: Review and Herald, 1996. S.v. “Pennsylvania Conference.”

Seventh-day Adventist Yearbooks. General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists Online Archives (GCA), https://documents.adventistarchives.org/Yearbooks/Forms/AllItems.aspx.

“Third Annual Report of the N.Y. and Northern Pa. Conference of Seventh-day Adventists.” ARH, October 25, 1864.

Underwood, R. A. “Report of Pennsylvania Camp-meeting.” ARH, July 7, 1903.

Vandeman, H. A. “East Pennsylvania: Allentown and Stroudsburg.” Columbia Union Visitor, January 8, 1925.

Notes

1. Seventh-day Adventist Online Yearbook, “Pennsylvania Conference,” accessed November 1, 2024, https://www.adventistyearbook.org/entity?EntityID=15857.↩

2. The history through 1963 presented in this article is adapted from Seventh-day Adventist Encyclopedia, 2^nd rev. edition (1996), s.v. “Pennsylvania Conference.” That is the source for all information through 1963 not documented by primary sources.↩

3. Hiram Edson, “From Bro. Edson,” ARH, September 2, 1851, 24.↩

4. N[athan] Fuller, “Meetings in Pa., and N. Y.,” ARH, August 14, 1860, 101.↩

5. The conference is called “New York Conference” in the reports of its first two sessions. The third session in 1864 uses “N.Y. and Northern Pa.” interchangeably with “N.Y. and Pa.” By 1865 “New York and Pennsylvania” seems to have become standardized. See “New York Conference Report,” ARH, December 1, 1863, 9; ”Third Annual Report of the N.Y. and Northern Pa. Conference of Seventh-day Adventists,” ARH, October 25, 1864, 174; “New York and Pennsylvania State Conference,” ARH, September 12, 1865, 120.↩

6. “New York and Pennsylvania Conference,” ARH, December 5, 1878, 102; Annual Statistical Report for 1879. The five counties in southwestern New York were transferred to the New York Conference territory sometime after 1889 when the Seventh-day Adventist Yearbook shows them as still part of Pennsylvania Conference, no later than 1902 when a directory included in the General Conference Bulletin (Second and Third Quarters, 1902) indicates that they were included in the New York Conference (see page 608).↩

7. See E.G. White, “Camp-Meeting at Williamsport, Pa.,” ARH, August 13, 1889, 513-514.↩

8. Annual Statistical Report for 1902.↩

9. R.A. Underwood, “Report of Pennsylvania Camp-meeting,” ARH, July 7, 1903, 16-17.↩

10. “Eastern Pennsylvania Conference,” Atlantic Union Gleaner, May 11, 1904, 2-8.↩

11. F.H. Robbins, “Proposed Colored Conference Organization,” Columbia Union Visitor, December 7, 1944, 1; “Minutes of the Colored Conference Organization Meeting for the Columbia Union Conference,” December 17-18, 1944, Allegheny Folder, Box A825, General Conference Archives; “History—Ebenezer S.D.A. Church,” accessed November 4, 2024, https://www.esdacphilly.com/history.↩

12. H.A. Vandeman, “East Pennsylvania: Allentown and Stroudsburg,” Columbia Union Visitor, January 8, 1925, 3.↩

13. “East Pennsylvania News Notes,” Columbia Union Visitor, July 18, 1929, 6.↩

14. W.H. Green, “Western Pennsylvania,” ARH, November 15, 1906, 19.↩

15. W. B. Mohr, “Pittsburgh Colored Church,” Columbia Union Visitor, September 11, 1924, 3.↩

16. Louis Canosa, “Lay Advisory Council Elects Officers For 1971,” Columbia Union Visitor, May 13, 1971, 8.↩

17. Information on evangelism, education, publishing work, and health ministries comprising the remainder of this article compiled by the author from Pennsylvania Conference records.↩