It might be a new year, but some things never change.
Your support, for instance, is steadfast and comforting in this fluctuating world. Thanks to you, we were able to reach our GivingTuesday goal once again! PHS will award four Research and Travel Grants in 2026, using the funds raised on December 2nd, 2025.
PHS reopened to the public on the 5th of this month, and our researchers wasted no time: we spent the first week back working with PHS Research Fellow Hong Zhang, a Professor of East Asian Studies at Colby College conducting research for her project, "Presbyterian Medical and Educational Missions in China, 1840-1950."
Speaking of Research Fellows...Wish you were here? Apply now to be considered for the 2026 cohort! We're accepting applications for our Research Fellowship Program until March 2, 2026. The program is designed to encourage faculty, independent researchers, and students to use and publish from the society's rich holdings, by awarding grants of $2,500.
A medical missionary translates medical textbooks from English to Chinese; a massive crowd for Sunday School; and the results of a survey on LGBTQ+ ordination.
PHS staffers Luci Duckson-Bramble and David Staniunas were in and around Charlotte, North Carolina in late June to join the biennial gathering of the National Black Presbyterian Caucus. Our thanks go out first to the organizers of the event, especially to our colleague Lynne Foreman. Here’s a snapshot of our time there.
In 1981, Gene Turner, self-described Presbyterian bureaucrat, former executive of the Synod of the Golden Gate and the Synod of the Northeast, was interviewed by Charles Quirk, part of a series on the UPCUSA and racism. In 2025, David Staniunas interviewed Gene at his home outside Syracuse, New York.
In June 2022, the 225th General Assembly passed item RGJ-12, directing "the Presbyterian Historical Society to create an online historical self-study tool for congregations and mid councils to investigate their own history" to better equip more churches to undertake this work. We would like to hear directly from churches and mid councils via a short, six-question survey, on what additional resources might be useful.
In his 87 years of life, Fry played the violin and Sousaphone, enlisted in the Marine Corps, became an ordained Presbyterian minister, involved himself heavily in civil rights activism in Chicago, was called to trial by the U.S. Senate, traveled the U.S. as a reporter, discovered passion for typesetting and publishing, crafted a magazine that shared his name, and more.
2026 marks the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of the Independence. Let's zip back in time to see how folks celebrated the Bicentennial of 1976 with the help of the Religious News Service Photograph Collection.
"Rabbi I. Usher Kirshblum, director of the New York Bicentennial Corporation, sounds the shofar during an ecumenical service marking the nation's bicentennial at Castle Clinton in New York's Battery Park. The shofar, or ram's horn, while today is primarily associated with the Jewish feast of Rosh Hashanah, was used in Biblical times to proclaim important national events. And that is what Rabbi Kirshblum did on the nation's 200th birthday—he sounded in the United States of America's third century."
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