The Story of our Health Message

The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union

In this decade, on November 18, 1874, the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union was organized. The next few years witnessed great activity on the part of this organization, with which is associated the name of Miss Frances E. Willard, who in 1879 was elected as its president. SHM 224.2

The influence both of the Reform Clubs and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union reached Battle Creek, Michigan, and drew the following comment from the editor of The Health Reformer: SHM 224.3

“The present temperance movement, under the auspices of the Reform Clubs and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, is the most remarkable reformation of the kind which this country has ever witnessed. ... The work is spreading with wonderful rapidity, and we sincerely hope it may do a vast amount of permanent good. Great good has already been done in our own city. Scores of men who had been notorious for drunkenness and dissipation have become sober; and from being idle vagabonds they are now filling offices of usefulness and trust with entire satisfaction.”—The Health Reformer, August, 1877. SHM 224.4

Mrs. White entered heartily into the advocacy of the temperance cause, and earnestly sought to induce her fellow believers to unite with others in forwarding this noble work. SHM 225.1

One of the first opportunities for co-operation with the temperance forces was afforded in the early part of 1874, in the city of Oakland, California, where Elders Cornell and Canright were conducting a series of tent meetings. A local option campaign was in progress, and the temperance forces were active. Some of the leaders in the movement requested the use of the large tent for a temperance rally. SHM 225.2

While the preachers were debating in their minds whether the granting of this request might not detract from the solemn subjects they had to present to the people, they received a message from Mrs. White. Not only did she urge them to permit the use of the tent for the temperance cause, but she encouraged the believers in the city and vicinity to do all in their power to bring the campaign to a successful issue. “By pen and voice and vote” she then, and consistently through the years that followed, urged those whom she could influence to wage the fight for temperance reform. SHM 225.3

Mrs. White’s counsel was followed. For several nights temperance rallies were held in the large tent; and when the temperance forces had won in the election, a great victory meeting was held. On this occasion the mayor of the city expressed the thanks of himself and his fellow citizens for the splendid co-operation they had received from the tent company, and he urged his audience now to give them a favorable hearing in the presentation of their message. SHM 225.4