Unitarian Universalist
Fellowship of Clinton
309 30th Ave. N., Clinton Iowa
52732
563-243-4972
Service at 10:30
Summer services at 9:30
The History of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Clinton
In
December of 1869, a group of Clinton residents got together to "form a
body corporate to be called "The First Universalist Society of Clinton,
Iowa." They purchased property at 4th Street and 4th Ave. So., where
Sacred Heart Church now stands, and constructed a frame building.
Chancy Lamb contributed $100 toward the building, and there is also
mention of the Young and Hosford families topping the list of donors.
The group was named for John Murray, a Universalist minister who in 1779 had organized the First Universalist Church in America. Universalism was already present in America, but Murray was its catalyst; he laid the foundation of the denomination, made its doctrines known to the general public, and was an important part of its original dynamic.
This First Universalist Society of Clinton hired a minister, a Reverend Hamilton, for the sum of $500 for six months; they also hired someone to sing for them, to be paid "$5 per Sabbath." There are newspaper accounts of a "social" in March 1871, and also that year a production of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" to raise money for the church. While the group disbanded after several years, it continued to sponsor lectures and entertainment as late as 1884.
In the early 1950s, a group calling itself the Gateway Unitarian Fellowship met for about four years in a gymnasium at the YWCA. That group included Muriel and Claude Wildman, and Dr. Peter Ucko and his mother.
In late 1979, several Clinton residents who had been attending the Davenport Unitarian Church (including the Farleys and Linda Foster) were encouraged by Alan Egly, minister of the Davenport church, to hold circle suppers in their homes. They gathered some like-thinking friends and started holding regular meetings at Clinton Community College, beginning in January 1981. (This location was in large part due to the fact that the college president, Dr. Charles Spence, and his family were members.)
Steve Crump, minister in LaSalle-Peru, IL., preached once a month in Clinton that year; by March 1982 he was conducting services here twice a month, with special funds from the Prairie Star District helping pay for his services. In May of 1981, the name Murray Unitarian Universalist Society was adopted. The Peoples Church in Cedar Rapids helped the fledgling group by holding a service here, and later sponsored a fundraising concert at the college by two of their members. A small brown pottery chalice (no longer in use) was a gift from Peoples Church.
The Hawkeye Cluster of October 1981 reported that the Murray UU Society had "two pre-schoolers, three or four 9-11 year olds, and five or six older kids...they are thinking toward R.E. The Society has 12 signed members, but 40 attended the service last week." According to the Hawkeye Cluster of March 1982, Dorthe Flick was trying to get parent input on philosophy for a R.E. program, and she met with Burlington UUs to get ideas. When the R.E. program did get started, Beth McKinney served on the R.E. committee and helped teach. One year the children, with help from their parents, designed and built a float which they entered in the Mardi Gras parade - and won a prize! In May 1984, nine young people presented the worship service.
Steve Crump left in January of 1983 to become minister of the Unitarian Church of Baton Rouge, LA. Martha Newman, a native of Missouri who had graduated from Meadville Lombard Theological School in Chicago, was invited to minister to the Society in August of 1983. Among those attending at that time were these familiar names: Farley, Flick, Foster, Hagenson, Huyck, March, McKinney, Rutenbeck, and Triplett. Martha served on a half-time basis until June of 1986. During her time here, she conducted a UU memorial service for Dr. Ucko. Word was that having a funeral service conducted by a Unitarian minister - and a woman at that! — was a little unsettling for a certain local funeral home.
Dr. Ucko left some money to the Davenport Unitarian Church, but Alan Egly and others who knew that Dr. Ucko had been a supporter of the Clinton group generously gave $1000 from his bequest to the Murray UU Society; this was seed money for our building fund.
In the early 1980s, the economic climate in Clinton took a downturn. Ultimately six member families left the area, including the Spences, and services were moved to the YWCA. Dwight Smith, minister of the Black Hawk UU Society, began serving as our minister in the fall of 1986, commuting from Waterloo-Cedar Falls. He helped conduct church business on Saturday afternoon, there was a potluck and board meeting Saturday evening, and then he'd present the service Sunday morning. There were no children in the congregation at this time and all the members were getting older. (A student teacher who was rooming at a member's home started attending the UU services too; she was a Presbyterian, but wanted to participate in community activities while she was in Clinton. Bruce Farley particularly enjoyed getting the girl's viewpoint - "having a young person with us was like a breath of fresh air," he said.)
Dwight served us until 1989, when he left us in the capable hands of a ministerial student he was supervising - Mary Beth O'Halloran. Mary Beth was doing her ministerial studies at the University of Dubuque, under an arrangement with the UUA. She came to Clinton twice monthly, and also served a yoked ministry with the Dubuque UUs until her ordination in Davenport in June 1991.
Big happenings in 1991!! The present building, formerly a Baptist church, was for sale, complete with all the furnishings, for $55,000!! Members helped with the down payment, and Claude Wildman arranged for the loan. We also received funds from the PSD Chalice Lighters program. The Rev. Charity Rowley of Iowa City became our first minister in the new building. At first she came up here twice a month, but later she served a yoked ministry with Dubuque and preached at each church once a month. (When our financial resources became strained, she graciously took a three-month leave of absence.) Charity retired in 1996 and became our Minister Emerita.
For the next two years (1996-98), Bob Hoffman from the Davenport Unitarian Church was our lay minister while he began the UUA's Commissioned Lay Leader program. Sometime after that, Lana Long from this church also started the CLL program and was our lay leader for approximately a year.
We were then without ministerial leadership until September 2003. That summer, Don Majors had written the president of Meadville Lombard Theological School to ask if there was a student who might be interested in helping our congregation. The president forwarded Don's letter to Roger Mohr, knowing Roger's background would be very helpful in our situation. (Roger had a strong business background, including an MBA, and had worked with individuals and groups in transition.) Roger became our "Fellowship Consultant" as well as supervised intern minister and gave us the impetus to make some necessary changes in order to grow and prosper.
Roger served us for three years until he graduated from Meadville Lombard. The UUF conducted his ordination in May 2006 and he was called to serve the Burlington Unitarian Church as their minister. We then hired a member of the congregation, Regina Parkinson, as Lay Minister. She would present two sermons a month as well as perform other duties. Unfortunately, her husband was transferred back to Texas and she had to resign her position after a few months. Since then we have relied on members of the congregation to lead our Sunday services.
We had changed our name from the Murray UU Society to the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship at some point, but when it came time to put the name on our new building, we couldn't agree on what word should follow "Unitarian Universalist." As you can see, we still haven't reached agreement! (However, we did have someone start attending who had thought, on driving down 3rd Street, that the words were "Unitarian University," and stopped to check it out.)
Shortly after we occupied this building, Fern Stevenson (who was our president at the time) started an Adult Day Care in what we now call the Olympia Brown Room. She felt there was a definite need in the community for this kind of care, but in spite of much effort on her part, the Adult Day Care was ahead of its time. and closed after three years, due to lack of enough paying clients. She did receive the 1996 Social Justice Award from the Prairie Star District in recognition of her work in getting the Adult Day Care up and running.
At different times, our building has housed the voting machines for the Fourth Ward, 1st Precinct; a tutorial program for nearby Elijah Buell School (now closed), and several Girl Scout troops. Currently the Olympia Brown room is used on occasional Sundays by the local chapter of the Methodist Federation for Social Action, and by a Spiritualist group. We also offer our church to nonmembers for weddings and holy unions. When we started providing wedding space, we authorized Fern Stevenson to conduct marriages; after she moved to Des Moines, we authorized Lana Long to serve in a similar capacity. Lana is still available to conduct weddings and funerals even though she has moved to Davenport and joined the Davenport Unitarian Church.
In the past we have held craft fairs, rummage sales and soup suppers as fundraisers. Our food booth at Art in the Park was our largest fundraiser until the event was cancelled in 2008.
The group was named for John Murray, a Universalist minister who in 1779 had organized the First Universalist Church in America. Universalism was already present in America, but Murray was its catalyst; he laid the foundation of the denomination, made its doctrines known to the general public, and was an important part of its original dynamic.
This First Universalist Society of Clinton hired a minister, a Reverend Hamilton, for the sum of $500 for six months; they also hired someone to sing for them, to be paid "$5 per Sabbath." There are newspaper accounts of a "social" in March 1871, and also that year a production of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" to raise money for the church. While the group disbanded after several years, it continued to sponsor lectures and entertainment as late as 1884.
In the early 1950s, a group calling itself the Gateway Unitarian Fellowship met for about four years in a gymnasium at the YWCA. That group included Muriel and Claude Wildman, and Dr. Peter Ucko and his mother.
In late 1979, several Clinton residents who had been attending the Davenport Unitarian Church (including the Farleys and Linda Foster) were encouraged by Alan Egly, minister of the Davenport church, to hold circle suppers in their homes. They gathered some like-thinking friends and started holding regular meetings at Clinton Community College, beginning in January 1981. (This location was in large part due to the fact that the college president, Dr. Charles Spence, and his family were members.)
Steve Crump, minister in LaSalle-Peru, IL., preached once a month in Clinton that year; by March 1982 he was conducting services here twice a month, with special funds from the Prairie Star District helping pay for his services. In May of 1981, the name Murray Unitarian Universalist Society was adopted. The Peoples Church in Cedar Rapids helped the fledgling group by holding a service here, and later sponsored a fundraising concert at the college by two of their members. A small brown pottery chalice (no longer in use) was a gift from Peoples Church.
The Hawkeye Cluster of October 1981 reported that the Murray UU Society had "two pre-schoolers, three or four 9-11 year olds, and five or six older kids...they are thinking toward R.E. The Society has 12 signed members, but 40 attended the service last week." According to the Hawkeye Cluster of March 1982, Dorthe Flick was trying to get parent input on philosophy for a R.E. program, and she met with Burlington UUs to get ideas. When the R.E. program did get started, Beth McKinney served on the R.E. committee and helped teach. One year the children, with help from their parents, designed and built a float which they entered in the Mardi Gras parade - and won a prize! In May 1984, nine young people presented the worship service.
Steve Crump left in January of 1983 to become minister of the Unitarian Church of Baton Rouge, LA. Martha Newman, a native of Missouri who had graduated from Meadville Lombard Theological School in Chicago, was invited to minister to the Society in August of 1983. Among those attending at that time were these familiar names: Farley, Flick, Foster, Hagenson, Huyck, March, McKinney, Rutenbeck, and Triplett. Martha served on a half-time basis until June of 1986. During her time here, she conducted a UU memorial service for Dr. Ucko. Word was that having a funeral service conducted by a Unitarian minister - and a woman at that! — was a little unsettling for a certain local funeral home.
Dr. Ucko left some money to the Davenport Unitarian Church, but Alan Egly and others who knew that Dr. Ucko had been a supporter of the Clinton group generously gave $1000 from his bequest to the Murray UU Society; this was seed money for our building fund.
In the early 1980s, the economic climate in Clinton took a downturn. Ultimately six member families left the area, including the Spences, and services were moved to the YWCA. Dwight Smith, minister of the Black Hawk UU Society, began serving as our minister in the fall of 1986, commuting from Waterloo-Cedar Falls. He helped conduct church business on Saturday afternoon, there was a potluck and board meeting Saturday evening, and then he'd present the service Sunday morning. There were no children in the congregation at this time and all the members were getting older. (A student teacher who was rooming at a member's home started attending the UU services too; she was a Presbyterian, but wanted to participate in community activities while she was in Clinton. Bruce Farley particularly enjoyed getting the girl's viewpoint - "having a young person with us was like a breath of fresh air," he said.)
Dwight served us until 1989, when he left us in the capable hands of a ministerial student he was supervising - Mary Beth O'Halloran. Mary Beth was doing her ministerial studies at the University of Dubuque, under an arrangement with the UUA. She came to Clinton twice monthly, and also served a yoked ministry with the Dubuque UUs until her ordination in Davenport in June 1991.
Big happenings in 1991!! The present building, formerly a Baptist church, was for sale, complete with all the furnishings, for $55,000!! Members helped with the down payment, and Claude Wildman arranged for the loan. We also received funds from the PSD Chalice Lighters program. The Rev. Charity Rowley of Iowa City became our first minister in the new building. At first she came up here twice a month, but later she served a yoked ministry with Dubuque and preached at each church once a month. (When our financial resources became strained, she graciously took a three-month leave of absence.) Charity retired in 1996 and became our Minister Emerita.
For the next two years (1996-98), Bob Hoffman from the Davenport Unitarian Church was our lay minister while he began the UUA's Commissioned Lay Leader program. Sometime after that, Lana Long from this church also started the CLL program and was our lay leader for approximately a year.
We were then without ministerial leadership until September 2003. That summer, Don Majors had written the president of Meadville Lombard Theological School to ask if there was a student who might be interested in helping our congregation. The president forwarded Don's letter to Roger Mohr, knowing Roger's background would be very helpful in our situation. (Roger had a strong business background, including an MBA, and had worked with individuals and groups in transition.) Roger became our "Fellowship Consultant" as well as supervised intern minister and gave us the impetus to make some necessary changes in order to grow and prosper.
Roger served us for three years until he graduated from Meadville Lombard. The UUF conducted his ordination in May 2006 and he was called to serve the Burlington Unitarian Church as their minister. We then hired a member of the congregation, Regina Parkinson, as Lay Minister. She would present two sermons a month as well as perform other duties. Unfortunately, her husband was transferred back to Texas and she had to resign her position after a few months. Since then we have relied on members of the congregation to lead our Sunday services.
We had changed our name from the Murray UU Society to the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship at some point, but when it came time to put the name on our new building, we couldn't agree on what word should follow "Unitarian Universalist." As you can see, we still haven't reached agreement! (However, we did have someone start attending who had thought, on driving down 3rd Street, that the words were "Unitarian University," and stopped to check it out.)
Shortly after we occupied this building, Fern Stevenson (who was our president at the time) started an Adult Day Care in what we now call the Olympia Brown Room. She felt there was a definite need in the community for this kind of care, but in spite of much effort on her part, the Adult Day Care was ahead of its time. and closed after three years, due to lack of enough paying clients. She did receive the 1996 Social Justice Award from the Prairie Star District in recognition of her work in getting the Adult Day Care up and running.
At different times, our building has housed the voting machines for the Fourth Ward, 1st Precinct; a tutorial program for nearby Elijah Buell School (now closed), and several Girl Scout troops. Currently the Olympia Brown room is used on occasional Sundays by the local chapter of the Methodist Federation for Social Action, and by a Spiritualist group. We also offer our church to nonmembers for weddings and holy unions. When we started providing wedding space, we authorized Fern Stevenson to conduct marriages; after she moved to Des Moines, we authorized Lana Long to serve in a similar capacity. Lana is still available to conduct weddings and funerals even though she has moved to Davenport and joined the Davenport Unitarian Church.
In the past we have held craft fairs, rummage sales and soup suppers as fundraisers. Our food booth at Art in the Park was our largest fundraiser until the event was cancelled in 2008.