Guide to the Frances Rosilla Burke Papers
Open for research.
The fledgling Woman's Executive Committee of Home Missions (PCUSA) commissioned Frances Burke a missionary to the Mormons in 1881. Leaving her home in Lebanon, OH, she arrived in Toquerville, UT in time to open her school in September.
Burke served Toquerville as schoolteacher and postmistress, and conducted Sunday services (the village was seldom visited by ordained Presbyterian pastors) in her combined chapel, home and schoolhouse. Due to the sparseness of the population in that part of Utah, the Women's Board eventually had to withdraw its financial support of Burke, but she remained in the community, continuing her work on her own income until her health gave out in 1925. She moved to St. George, UT and lived out her remaining two years there.
This collection includes photographs of Burke and her students, as well as prizes she took at the county fair for her fruits and vegetables and a biographical article by William Mitchell Paden.
Related collections include:
RG 195 William Mitchell Paden Papers
RG 305 Woman's Executive Committee/Woman's Board of Home
Missions Records
Collection processed and finding aid prepared: October 1993
Stephanie Muntone, Processing Archivist
| Box | Folder | Description | |
| 1 | 1 | Finding Aid to Record Group 378 | |
| 1 | 2 | "The Postmistress of Toquerville," by W.M. Paden, 1927 | |
| 1 | 3 | Certificates, 1899 | |
| 1 | 4 | Photographs, undated |