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Note: r than her name and birth date which had been copied from a family Bible by some distant relative. In the fall of 2002, I was searching for my great great grandparents’ (Mary’s parents) graves in Haven Hill Cemetery. Next to Jeremiah and Adelia’s 100-year-old marker, I was surprised to find an almost new headstone at Mary’s grave. The stone, which has obviously been placed in the last 25 years, has the following inscription on the back: Miss Mary Phillips graduated in the second class of Olney High School (1874). She attended the Garrett Biblical Institute in Evanston, IL becoming the first U.S. woman to graduate with a degree in theology. Despite ample preaching experience, the 1880 Methodist Conference on Itinerancy in Cincinnati decided to report ‘women already have all the rights and privileges in the Methodist Church that are good for them.’ According to her father, Dr. Jeremiah W. Phillips ‘Mary died at the age of 21 from a broken heart.’ Hence came Olney’s first national publicity from a lengthy article in the NewYork Sun.
The Richland County Genealogy and Historical Society graciously provided much of the material that follows.
Mary Adelia Phillips was the youngest, by far, of the five children. She was born in Lansing, MI on Nov. 25, 1858, 11 years after Charles, and moved with the family to Richland County the following year. In 1861, when her brothers enlisted, the three-year-old girl suddenly became an only child of middle aged parents. It would be safe to say that she was the apple of her father’s eye.
Mary was part of the second graduating class of Olney High School, and then graduated from the Garret Theological Institute, the Methodist School of Theology, at Evanston, IL in 1879. According to an article in the Olney Times on June 11, 1879:
Miss Mary A. Phillips, who has been attending the Theological Seminary at Evanston, Ill., returned to her home in this city a few days ago. Miss Phillips enjoys the distinction of being the only lady in the United States who ever graduated in Theology. She occupied the pulpit of the Methodist Church in Clay City on last Sunday morning and evening.
Her father said that when she was very young, she possessed the feeling that she had been called to the ministry.
I know that she tried long and hard to get rid of the feeling. Many nights in her little room, she cried and sobbed herself to sleep when we did not know the cause. She shrunk from the task of becoming a preacher, for she was a sensitive plant, but at last when it became a question of life and death of her soul, she yielded and commenced in earnest her preparation for the ministry. She read in secret for a long time, and always read theological works. At length, with slender means, she started for the Garrett Biblical Institute, young and alone, no protector but God, no guide but the Holy Ghost. We saw her off, waved her many good-bye, and as the train moved away we could see her pale face, wet with tears, pressed against the window, where it remained until the train was out of sight.
After she graduated from Garrett, Mary came home and was preaching at different churches in the in area. In order to obtain a church for full time employment, it was necessary to get the sanction of the Southern Illinois Conference.
In September of 1879, Mary applied for membership at the M.E. Conference at Salem, Ill. Rev. Thomas F. Houts, the pastor of the Olney church and Rev. John Leeper, presiding elder, were in favor of admitting her to conference membership. When a canvass was made of the members, it was estimated that about two-thirds of the members were in favor of admitting her. Bishop Edward G. Andrews, who presided at the Conference, had met her in the Theological Institute at Evanston, and had learned of Mary’s preparation to do Conference work. As he gave no hint of disapproval of her course, and made no suggestion to dissuade her from pursuing her studies, he was thought to be favorably disposed toward her. But when a motion was made to recognize her, that she might be permitted to work for the Christian cause, Bishop Andrews said: “I will not entertain the motion”.
The article from the Olney Times (May 25, 1881) goes on to say:
The young woman never recovered from the shock caused by these words. She began to waste away, and died on August 16, 1880, aged 21 years, eight months and 21 days. “Until the light of eternity shows me my mistake,” says her father, “I shall believe that the blood of my dear child rests upon the head of the bishop. Why did he not tell her at Evanston that she had mistaken the character of the M.E. church, and that she could not be received? She never for once thought of opposition from the bishop, and she had faith in the church and its chief ministers…The day will come when women of the church will enjoy equal rights. Mr. Phillips went to work to vindicate the right of women to preach, and succeeded in obtaining from the quarterly conference at Olney, Ill., a license for a Miss Longwood. Bishop Andrews sent to Olney as pastor of the Phillips family one of those who opposed opening the conference doors to women. The choice was taken as an indication that the bishop meant to cure Olney of its desire for women preachers. But the new pastor, the Rev. William Wallis, was besieged by the adherents of the cause of women’s rights to preach, who sympathized with Jeremiah Phillips, and in April last he preached a sermon which was accepted as his capitulation inasmuch as he referred in terms of praise to what women had accomplished as preachers. This stirred up Mr. Phillips, who shouted a vigorous “amen.” “ I hope the bishop,” he said, “will send another man of that sort.”
Before Mary’s death at her father’s home, she applied again in 1880 for acceptance, this time to the General Conference in Cincinnati. From the June 2, 1880 edition of the Olney Times:
Rev. Miss Mary Phillips, of this city, and one or two other ladies who appealed to the Methodist Conference recently in session at Cincinnati, for admission to the ministry, were not successful. The conference on Itinerancy, by a vote of 28 to 20, decided to report that women already have all the rights and privileges in the Methodist Church that are good for them, and that it is not expedient to make any change in the Book of Discipline that would open the door for their ordination to the ministry. The discussion was lively, not to say heated. The Rev. Hatfield argued that God meant women to be wives and mothers, not preachers. The Rev. Buckley warned the brethren that if they once opened the doors, the old maids would throng in from all the other denominations, feminine arts would be brought to bear on the Presiding Elders to secure good appointments, scandals would arise, the road to the pulpit would be choked with voluble and emotional women, and there would be the mischief to pay generally.
Olney received national attention when the New York Sun published Mary Phillips’s story in an article covering young women preachers and the trouble they encountered. The portion of that article pertaining to Mary was later run in the Olney Times on May 25, 1881.
A few months ago, our family found an old suitcase that had belonged to my grandmother. Inside was a mixture of old photos, her father’s (Charles) sermon notes, unknown locks of hair and a letter written by Mary Phillips to her parents. She was writing home from school in Evanston on Oct. 24, 1878. She writes about ordinary things: a lecture that she attended on India and Japan; her efforts to find someone to carry coal for her from the basement to her room on the upper floor; being on the “Chandelier and Curtains” committee of her Literary Society to furnish a new room; getting a new roommate. One item of particular interest was, after a very long lecture, she writes:
I was completely tired out. Monday I went to school, but Tuesday I spent a good part of the night at my old occupation, coughing, so did not go to school. I am feeling pretty well now. I really do not know whether my health is any better than when at home this summer or not… Yesterday I called on Mrs. Wakeman, and Mr. W. gave me a bottle of medicine for my cough. Whiskey, molasses, balsam fir, oil of tar etc. etc. I do not know that one day is any trial at all, but I believe it is going to help me more than anything I have had for a long time.
Jeremiah Phillips claimed that his daughter died of a broken heart, the depression caused by her denial for admittance to the ministry probably played a major role in her death. However, this letter written by Mary two years before she died indicates a longstanding health problem. My grandmother (Mary’s niece) suffered from severe asthma most of her life, and she indicated that this affliction “ran in the family.” Nonetheless, there is no question that Mary Phillips and her father, along with the Methodist congregation of Olney, played a very important role in opening the door for women in the ministry.
Note: . Until about three years ago, little was known about Mary Phillips othe
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