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Show 1883-1893 The record of the first meeting of the Board in the second decade reads like this: '' Seven o 'clock, eight o 'clock, nine o 'clock, how it did pour! but four of our valiant officers sallied forth from their San Francisco homes and another from her Redwood City home, and found their way to join the Oakland and Berkeley ladies in Hopkins Academy for morning committee meeting." And of the afternoon public session the secretary says, "One o'clock, two o'clock! The very heavens seemed let loose! so there were not many at our afternoon meeting in Plymouth Avenue church. But we all felt that it was good to be there.'' One is impressed in reading these reports from month to month, with the joy felt in the service, with the consecration of time and effort, so happily given. Expressions like the following often appear: "The things of the Master's Kingdom become our especial care during the hours we spend together, and right sweet the care-taking seems. Our precious meetings! what a joy to attend them! what a sorrow it would be to have to give them u p ! " ; Annual meetings from year to year carried the interest into difl'erent parts of the state, and as Mrs. Smith records, "were crises in our history;" the meeting for 1884 being held in Stockton and signalized by the INIission Board of Oregon and Washington joining the Board as a Branch; that of 1885 marked by the resignation on account of ill health of Miss Starkweather of Japan. This vacancy was filled almost immediately by the appointrnxcnt of Miss Effie B. Gunnison of Bethany Church, San Francisco, who sailed that fall. The Young Ladies' Branch was organized and took over her support. Woodland, Sacramento, Alameda, Tulare had the honor of entertaining the annual meetings that followed, after which San Francisco took its place as the legal setting for these gatherings. Names like Mrs. Arthur Smith of China, Mrs. Stuyes, and Chief Henry Nanpei of Micronesia, Mrs. William Gulick of Spain and Dr. Pauline Root of India, appear as the drawing cards among the speakers. In 1888 Miss Florence Denton was appointed to the Doshisha, Kyoto, Japan, and the following year Southern California organized as a [" ]6 1 |