Biography

The Mary Werlein Mission Methodist Episcopal Church South (New Orleans, La.) traces its history to the Tchoupitoulas Mission Methodist Episcopal Church South (New Orleans, La.), which was established around 1893 in the Irish Channel neighborhood. In 1895, the New Orleans District Woman’s Parsonage and Home Missionary Society (WPHMS) assumed financial responsibility for the mission. Membership records imply Mary Werlein formally joined the congregation in 1907; around this time the name changed to the Mary Werlein Mission. The mission appears to have been discontinued around 1925. As noted by Ellen Blue in "St. Mark's and the Social Gospel: Methodist Women and Civil Rights in New Orleans, 1895-1965" (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2011):

In addition to providing a place for street preaching and evangelism, the Werlein Mission carried out urban ministries under the direction of Lillie Meekins, a city missionary from Covington [Louisiana]. In residence at the mission, Meekins was surrounded by mills, factories, and the tenements where poorly paid laborers lived. She was determined to improve the lives of those around her. Mary Werlein, the mission’s primary fund-raiser and a leader within the WPHMS, spent her time working for the church, leading religious services in jails, and participating in activist women’s organizations, especially those concerned with providing safe housing for single women.

Found in 1 Collection or Record: