Anna Fisher Beiler (February 25, 1848 – April 1, 1904) was a British-born American Christian missionary and newspaper editor, who engaged in temperance, missionary, and philanthropic work. Associated with the Methodist Episcopal Church, she served as Secretary of the Bureau for District of Alaska. She thoroughly identified herself with this work, and visited the region in 1897, that she might do better at directing it. She made an extended tour in the service of that region in the interests of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and supervised the erection of the building in Unalaska. Beiler was a prominent officer of the Woman's Home Missionary Society for many years and influential in the shaping of its policy and work. She lectured on Alaska in many states, increasing the public interest.
Early life and education
Anna Fisher was born February 25, 1848, in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. She was the only daughter of John and Ann Comble Fisher. Her parents came to the United States when she was nine months old, and settled in Middleport, Ohio. Her father was there an official member of the church for fifty years, and her mother for many years was chorister, class leader, steward, and Sunday school superintendent, teaching 1,040 lessons without a break.
Here, Beilor was converted during her girlhood, and joined the church under the pastorate of Dr. Gardner. After graduating from high school she taught two years, then entered Ohio Wesleyan University. The records of her scholarship and Christian influence In the university were excellent. She served as president of her class, and of the literary society, and was one of the speakers on commencement day. During her senior year she was very active in the canvass which closed all the saloons in the town. At the university, she met Samuel Lynch Beiler, and they became engaged shortly before her graduation in 1872.
Career
After graduation, the engaged couple offered themselves for foreign mission work, expecting to go to China, but the American Methodist Episcopal Mission was not able to send them at that time. She then became a teacher under the Freedmen's Aid Society and Southern Education Society, and taught one year in New Orleans University. The yellow fever preventing her return the following year she was sent to Huntsville, Alabama, as principal of the seminary there.
On June 8, 1875, she married Dr. Samuel Lynch Beiler (1847–1917). and they went to Boston, where her husband was a student in the university and pastor of a church in Quincy, Massachusetts. Here, she mastered all the studies in science and philosophy which her husband was taking. During the next year, the Red Ribbon Reform Movement, under Dr. Henry A. Reynolds, was brought to Quincy by her husband, and a Reform Club of 1,400 men was organized. In connection with this, a Woman's Temperance Union of 500 women was organized, and Mrs. Beiler was made the president. During the year, she made many addresses throughout Massachusetts, and was vice president of the Union of Massachusetts, with Mary Livermore as president.
In 1877, Dr. Beiler joined the Central Ohio Conference. Here, she took the full course of Conference studies and attended all the examinations. She was very active in church work, especially in revival services and in connection with the Woman's Missionary Society in which she became district and Conference officer.
At the General Conference held in Cincinnati in 1880, Dr. and Mrs. Beiler offered themselves for Alaska to open up a new Mission, and her disappointment was great when they learned that the society was not prepared to begin the work. After seven years of work in Ohio, a transfer came to New York East Conference, and two years were spent in Hartford, Connecticut, and five in Brooklyn, New York. During these years, besides her activity in the churches, making pastoral calls with her husband, speaking for and organizing missionary societies, she became interested In the Methodist Home for the Aged that was being organized and built in Brooklyn. For two years, she edited and published a paper in connection with fairs held for the Home, from which she realized each year. She also edited a paper in the interest of the Brooklyn Hospital. Later, she did the same for the Methodist Hospital.