Phoebe Hearst was a well-known philanthropist and the wife of Senator George E Hearst. She had embraced the Faith in 1898 through Lua Getsinger while on a visit to California. Shortly after she expressed her intention of visiting 'Abdu'l-Bahá in the Holy Land and invited several believers, among them Dr and Mrs Getsinger, Dr Khayru'llah and his wife, to join her, and completed the necessary arrangements for their historic pilgrimage to 'Akká. In Paris several resident Americans, among whom were May Ellis Belles, whom Lua Getsinger had won over to the Faith, Miss Pearson, and Ann Apperson, both nieces of Mrs Hearst, with Mrs Thornburgh and her daughter, were added to the party, the number of which was later swelled in Egypt by the addition of Dr Khayru'llah's daughters and their grand-mother whom he had recently converted.
(Adapted from ‘The Child of the Covenant’ by
Adib Taherzadeh)
