Hand of the Cause Valiyu'llah Varqa with some South American friends at Rio de Janeiro airport, 1953

(Baha'i News, August 1953)

Queen Marie of Romania

 

Hand of the Cause Leroy Ioas with his wife Sylvia

 

Hand of the Cause Leroy Ioas and his wife Sylvia with Habib Sabet and his wife Bahera

Hand of the Cause Tarazu'llah Samandari with Ali Nakhjavani

 Mr. Samandari (right) had met Baha'u'llah in his youth.

Hand of the Cause Dr. Ugo Giachery with his wife Angeline

Laura Drefus Barney

Clara Dunn and Hyde Dunn

 

Phoebe Apperson Hearst

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)

Florence Breed Khan and Ali-Kuli Khan

Florence Breed was born in 1875 in Lynn, Massachusetts. She passed away on 24 June 1950 in Englewood, New Jersey. She was a Baha'i actress. Her parents were Alice Ives Breed and Francis William Breed, both also Baha’is. In 1904 she married Mirza Ali-Kuli Khan. Their children met 'Abdu'l-Baha at their home in Washington, D.C. on 23 April 1912.

Ali-Kuli Khan (Nabili'd-Dawlih) was born on 10 May 1879 in Kashan, Persia. He passed away on 7 April 1966 in Washington, D. C. He joined the Faith in 1895. In 1910 he became the Persian charge d'affaires to the United States and served in a number of diplomatic missions. He invited 'Abdu'I-Baha to a reception at the Persian legation on 17 April, 1912. He was also with 'Abdu'l-Baha when He attended a meeting at the home of Alexander Graham Bell on 24 April 1912 in Washington, D.C. He was a member of the Bahai Temple Unity in 1913 and 1917; and of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'is of the United States and Canada in 1925 to 1926.

(Adapted from “Abdu’l-Baha in the West, A biographical guide of the people associated with His travels”, by Jan Teofil Jasion)

Juliet Thompson in her studio

 

Dorothy Baker and John Robarts, 1948

(Baha'i News, June 1948)

Sadie Oglesby 1881-1956: Third African American to go on pilgrimage, 1927

(The American Baha'i, March/April 2020)

Noel Wuttunee of Calgary Alberta, the first Canadian Indian Baha'i, with his wife

(The Baha'i World 1950-1954)

Hand of the Cause John Robarts

Ruhiyyih Khanum

Shoghi Effendi with Dr. John Esslemont in Bournemouth England

Haifa, 1957: Saichiro Fujita, Adelaide Sharp, and Anges Alexander

(Baha'i News, no. 630, December 1983)

1907: Thornton Chase on Mount Carmel

Early Baha’is of Botswana: James and Stella Moncho

(Baha'i Media Bank)

1968: Hand of the Cause Enoch Olinga and Mrs. Elizabeth Olinga, Palermo Sicily Conference

(Baha'i Media Bank)

1916: Agnes Alexander with a group of Bahá’ís in Tokyo, Japan

(Baha'i Media Bank)

Keith-Ransom-Keher – Hand of the Cause, first American Baha’i martyr; “the symbol of the unity of the East and West”

Mrs. Keith Ransom-Kehler's passing is, indeed, an irretrievable loss which the Bahá'í world has come to suffer at a time when her presence in their midst was so greatly needed, not only because of her inspiring personality, but due to her intelligent, wise and energetic handling of the many and varied problems confronting the followers of the Faith in Persia. For more than one year she toiled and suffered, undismayed by the forces of darkness which so increasingly challenge the devotion and loyalty, and hamper the progress of the work, of our Persian brethren. Nothing was strong enough to sap the vitality of her faith and neither the opposition of the Government, nor the slackness and inefficiency of those with whom she had to work, could possibly discourage and dishearten her. Her faith was deep, her energy inexhaustible. And she was, indeed, fully repaid for all that she did, whether in connection with the teaching of the Message, or in regard to the consolidation of the nascent administrative institutions of the Cause in the very land of its birth.

Manuel Gorgas - First Indian Baha'i of Panama

(The Baha'i World 1946-1950)

Mirzá Muhammad-Báir - the first in Mashhad, Persia, to embrace the Cause of the Báb; - builder of Bábíyyih, the first Baha’i center; designer of structural reinforcement of Fort Tabarsi; lieutenant and trusted counsellor of Quddús

Mírzá Muhammad-Báqir, known as Haratí, though originally a resident of Qayin. He was a close relative of the father of Nabíl-i-Akbar, and was the first in Mashhad to embrace the Cause. It was he who built the Bábíyyih, and who devotedly served Quddús during his sojourn in that city. When Mullá Husayn hoisted the Black Standard, he, together with his child, Mírzá Muhammad-Kázim, eagerly enrolled under his banner and went forth with him to Mázindarán… It was Mírzá Muḥammad-Báqir who acted as the standard-bearer of the company, who designed the plan of the fort, its walls and turrets and the moat which surrounded it, who succeeded Mullá Husayn in organising the forces of his companions and in leading the charge against the enemy, and who acted as the intimate companion, the lieutenant and trusted counsellor of Quddús until the hour when he fell a martyr in the path of the Cause. 

- Nabil  (‘The Dawn-Breakers’; translated and edited by Shoghi Effendi)

1978: Angus Cowan, Duane Troxel and another believer at 5th International Baha'i Convention, Haifa

Hand of the Cause Enoch Olinga

Fujita

Hands of the Cause of God: Khadem, Roberts, and Samandari

Charles Dunning & Ted Cardell, 1965 - two Knights of Baha'u'llah

Charles Dunning, the Englishman who became the Knight of Bahá'u'lláh for the Orkney Islands at the age of seventy. (Violette Nakhjavani, ‘The Great African Safari’)

One of Rúhíyyih Khánum's favourite stories was about the Guardian and Charles Dunning. Charlie Dunning was a wonderful Bahá'í, a little man, and he looked like Popeye. And at the table, the Guardian would sit here and Charlie would sit there at the end of the table because he was a Knight of Bahá'u'lláh, and they would lean towards each other and talk, and he would wave his finger at the Shoghi Effendi's nose and say "Guardian. they tell me so and so", and the Guardian would lean towards him and answer, and they would talk in this way. The Guardian loved Charles Dunning. He saw the beauty and the spirit in Charlie although most people would think he was a funny little man. And the thing that struck me after Charlie had been on pilgrimage, and it's made me think a lot about the way one's appearance mirrors one's soul, you might say, because Charlie spoke at the National Convention about his pilgrimage, and the thing that struck me was that superficially Charlie was an ugly little man, but when he was talking he was beautiful. Really beautiful. And he hadn't changed, his features were the same, but this was a beautiful person talking, and I think his soul was as it were reflecting what the Guardian had seen in him. (Ian Semple, from a talk: ‘The Guardianship and the Universal House of Justice’)

Edmund (Ted) Cardell became a Bahá'í in Canada in 1948 and returned to his father's farm in England some time later. He pioneered to Kenya in October 1951 where he was a founder member of the first local Assembly in Nairobi. He became Knight of Bahá'u'lláh for South West Africa in 1953 and returned to England in 1963. He was elected to the National Assembly in 1973. (Biographical Notes; 'Unfolding Destiny’)

George Townshend – “dearly loved, much admired, greatly gifted, outstanding Hand of Cause”

circa 1920

Deeply mourn the passing of dearly loved, much admired, greatly gifted, outstanding Hand of Cause George Townshend. His death on morrow [1957] of publication of his crowning achievement [Christ and Baha'u'llah] robs the British followers of Baha'u'llah of their most distinguished collaborator and Faith itself of one of its stoutest defenders. His sterling qualities, his scholarship, his challenging writings, his high ecclesiastical position unrivalled by any Baha'i in western world, entitle him to rank with Thomas Breakwell and Dr. Esslemont, one of three luminaries shedding brilliant luster on annals of Irish, English and Scottish Baha'i communities. His fearless championship of the Cause he loved so dearly, served so valiantly, constitutes significant landmark in British Baha'i history. So enviable a position calls for national tribute to his memory by assembled delegates and visitors at forthcoming British Baha'i Convention. Assure relatives of deepest loving sympathy in grievous loss. Confident his reward is inestimable in Abha Kingdom.

- Shoghi Effendi  (‘Messages to the Baha'i World’)