Power, Passion, and Faith: Emmy Carlsson Evald, Suffragist and Social Activist by Sharon M. Wyman (review)

Reviewed by: Power, Passion, and Faith: Emmy Carlsson Evald, Suffragist and Social Activist by Sharon M. Wyman Maria Erling Power, Passion, and Faith: Emmy Carlsson Evald, Suffragist and Social Activist. By Sharon M. Wyman. St. Louis: Open Books Press, 2022. 211 pp. Readers of Lutheran Quarterly will be grateful for this detailed and intimate account of the work of Emilie Christina Emmy Carlsson Evald (1857–1946), chiefly known for founding the Augustana Lutheran Church's Women's Missionary Society in 1892, which she End Page 246 led for 43 years. In this study written by her great granddaughter, Evald's work to create a women's society to promote missions within the Swedish American Lutheran church body receives a full treatment. In addition, Wyman presents information on Evald's education in Sweden and in America that led to longstanding contacts with leaders in the suffrage movement. Evald's roles as a pastor's wife, mother, Sunday School teacher, publicist, and orator are sympathetically narrated. The Augustana Women's Missionary Society WMS stood as Evald's lifetime achievement. She enlisted women in a concerted effort to educate and inspire the women of their church to further service and commitment. Using modern organizing efforts, including the founding of a magazine, Mission Tidings in 1906, the women in the Augustana Church were well informed in both Swedish and English about their calling to "Go and Tell. " Evald's rhetorical skills in person and through the pen led a society that grew to 60, 000 members, mustering support for the construction of 74 mission buildings in the United States, China, Africa, India, the Holy Land, and Canada. The society provided for 34 missionaries and built homes for women in Chicago and in New York during Evald's time as president. Evald's immersion in the work of the WMS had been possible in part because she had been widowed when she was in her early 50's and no longer held responsibility as a pastor's wife. With her two daughters married, she was free to travel internationally, and to devote herself entirely to the work of the WMS. Because of the society's reputation for successful fundraising, it was asked in 1921 to raise money for a dormitory at the Rock Island, Illinois campus of Augustana College. Choosing an architect, stipulating high end furnishings, and stirring the women of the church to provide the funds, Evald successfully raised over 110, 000, but her "take charge" effort to control the location of the building led to conflict with college leaders. Local women in Rock Island also disagreed with Evald's wishes about the site. The conflict resulted in a "win" for the college, but the WMS refused to attend the dedication. This contest did considerable damage to Evald's relationships with the church leadership and with other women leaders in what she had long felt was her society. End Page 247 Wyman's account leads us on to an impasse between new leaders of the WMS and Evald, when the board tangled with her over the management and financing of the Lutheran Home for women in New York City. Evald directed the home for the WMS but the relationship devolved, during her final years there, into a conflict that nearly resulted in her eviction from the premises in her 81st year. It is an embarrassing story. Sharon Wyman's tribute to Emmy Evald fills an important gap in our understanding of women's leadership within American Lutheranism. She has access to records that have been kept within the family. These records show that Emmy Evald did not share the view of many church women that political involvement was unsuitable for them. Further examination of the complementary way that Evald advanced women's leadership through promoting mission work and political activity is more possible now that Wyman's account is available. A fuller picture of the leadership conflicts within women's circles is revealed, making their achievements even more remarkable. End Page 248 Maria Erling United Lutheran Seminary Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Copyright © 2024 Johns Hopkins University Press and Lutheran Quarterly, Inc.