Joan Mary Fry
Encyclopedia
Joan Mary Fry was an English social reformer and a Quaker
.
s. She was the daughter of a judge, Sir Edward Fry
and his wife, Mariabella Hodgkin (1833 – 1930), and sister of art critic Roger Fry
who was a member of the avant-garde Bloomsbury Group
.
, she served as a Quaker Prison Chaplain and helped men who had a conscientious objection to war at their tribunal and in prison.
In 1919, she and other Friends travelled to the now-defeated Germany and organised food distribution networks as famine relief there. Seven years later, Fry returned to the United Kingdom in 1926 where she further worked to relieve poverty and unemployment.
She gave the 1910 Swarthmore Lecture
, entitled The Communion of Life to the Quakers' “London Yearly Meeting
”.
'Papers in collections'
Religious Society of Friends
The Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
.
Early life
Joan Fry was born on 27 July 1862 in London, into a wealthy family of QuakerReligious Society of Friends
The Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
s. She was the daughter of a judge, Sir Edward Fry
Edward Fry
Sir Edward Fry GCB, GCMG, PC, FRS , was a judge in the British Court of Appeal and also an arbitrator on the International Permanent Court of Arbitration. He was a Quaker, son of Joseph Fry and Mary Ann Swaine....
and his wife, Mariabella Hodgkin (1833 – 1930), and sister of art critic Roger Fry
Roger Fry
Roger Eliot Fry was an English artist and art critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Establishing his reputation as a scholar of the Old Masters, he became an advocate of more recent developments in French painting, to which he gave the name Post-Impressionism...
who was a member of the avant-garde Bloomsbury Group
Bloomsbury Group
The Bloomsbury Group or Bloomsbury Set was a group of writers, intellectuals, philosophers and artists who held informal discussions in Bloomsbury throughout the 20th century. This English collective of friends and relatives lived, worked or studied near Bloomsbury in London during the first half...
.
Work
During the First World WarWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, she served as a Quaker Prison Chaplain and helped men who had a conscientious objection to war at their tribunal and in prison.
In 1919, she and other Friends travelled to the now-defeated Germany and organised food distribution networks as famine relief there. Seven years later, Fry returned to the United Kingdom in 1926 where she further worked to relieve poverty and unemployment.
She gave the 1910 Swarthmore Lecture
Swarthmore Lecture
Swarthmore Lecture is one of a series of lectures, started in 1908, addressed to Britain Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends .The preface to the very first lecture explains the purpose of the series....
, entitled The Communion of Life to the Quakers' “London Yearly Meeting
Britain Yearly Meeting
The Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends in Britain, also known as Britain Yearly Meeting , is a religious organisation in England, Scotland, Wales, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, often defined as a denomination of Christianity.It is a part of the international religious...
”.
Personal life
When her sister in law Helen Coombe, was institutionalised, she helped her brother Roger with bringing up his children.Source
- Oxford Dictionary of National Biography article by Sybil Oldfield, ‘Fry, Joan Mary (1862–1955)’,, Oxford University Press, 2004 http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/38522 accessed 27 Dec 2006.
Joan Mary Fry's publications
as listed in the catalogue of the Library of the Religious Society of Friends, London http://www.quaker.org.uk/Templates/Internal.asp?NodeID=89914- The communion of life. - 1910
- For fellowship and freedom : some aspects of the Society of Friends. - 1908, Published in German ?1920: Freundschaft und Freiheit : einige Gesichtspunkte zum Verständnis der Gesellschaft der Freunde. Published in Swedish, 1921: Gemenskap och frihet : några synpunkter till klargörande av Vännernas Sällskap.
- In downcast Germany 1919-1933. - 1944 published in German: Zwischen zwei Weltkriegen in Deutschland : Erinnerungen einer Quäkerin. 1947
- Sidelights on Biblical texts. - [1956]
'Papers in collections'
- Some papers and addresses from the Friends summer school, Birmingham, September, 1899 / Rawnsley, H. D.; Graham, John William, Fry, Edward; Cremer, Pastor; Fry, Joan Mary; Wallis, Mary Anne, 1847-1918; Govan, Horace E.; Grubb, Edward, 1854-1939; Braithwaite, William Charles.
- Christ and peace : a discussion of some fundamental issues raised by the war : essays / St. George Heath, J.; Fry, Joan Mary.
- Echoes from Scarborough : being a series of papers read at the Scarborough Summer School, 1897 / Braithwaite, William Charles; Crosfield, Gulielma; Fry, Joan Mary; Hodgkin, Thomas; Littleboy, William; Richardson, Anne Wakefield; Rowntree, John Stephenson; Newman, Henry Stanley; Wallis, Mary Anne.
- Friends lend a hand in alleviating unemployment : the story of a social experiment extending over 20 years, 1926-1946 / Fry, Joan Mary; Richmond, Arthur Cyril. 1947