Welcome to the Iowa Bahá’í History Project!
Collecting and archiving the history of Bahá’ís in Iowa
About the Project
This effort to collect, organize, preserve, and share the history of the Baha’i Faith in Iowa began largely in response to the film GLIMPSES OF A HUNDRED YEARS OF ENDEAVOR, commissioned by the Universal House of Justice, released in January of 2022, and featured at thousands of “Vision for Humanity” Conferences taking place around the globe. The release statement from the Baháʼí World Center describes GLIMPSES… in these words:
“The film provides insight into a hundred years of endeavor and learning since the passing of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in 1921, carried out by a burgeoning Bahá’í community, and outlines the journey that has led to the community’s current efforts to contribute to the emergence of a world organized around the principle of the oneness of humanity.” The 66-minute film is available in Arabic, English, French, Persian, Russian, Spanish, and Swahili. The film can also be viewed on YouTube. (Baha’i World Centre, January 5, 2022).
Clarification
The Iowa Baha’i History Project is an individual initiative pursued and offered by Diane, Christiana, Al, Meghan, Mike, and Jo, with the indispensable help of all contributors and participants in the ongoing process. It is not the product of any Baha’i institution and carries no official status or authority. In addition, we are working mainly from memory and use some crowdsourced resources like Bahaipedia, so there will be inaccuracies in dates and details and inevitable differences in how individuals perceive and understand events from the past. We invite corrections and additional perspectives and will attempt to correct specific facts and refine the accuracy of features like the timeline as we go.
This project absolutely depends on the interest and participation of people who became Baha’is in Iowa or who have lived and served as Baha’is in Iowa. We want and need a wide variety of voices sharing this history. We invite and eagerly anticipate your contributions of facts and figures, personal memories or “glimpses,” inspiring stories, photos, media coverage, recorded interviews… Anything that will flesh out and enrich our exploration. Please send submissions to IowaBahaiHistory@gmail.com.
We hope you’ll enjoy browsing the site, invite others to do the same, and think about what valuable “glimpses” you have to share!
Commenting and Registration
This website is open for everyone to browse. If you want to leave comments, you must register as a user. This is for the purpose of reducing spam. Your registration will be held as pending until reviewed by an administrator, which should happen within a day or two. Register here: https://iowabahaihistory.org/register/
Thank you for your understanding and patience with these requirements.