Background on Winthrop Monthly Meeting (Society of Friends)
Abbie Loring in Cape Cod Quaker attire, ca.1930.
Photo by Alton H. Blackington
Beginning as a meeting for worship in Leeds, Maine, in 1782, the present-day Winthrop Monthly Meeting of the Society of Friends became a preparative meeting under care of Durham Monthly in 1811, before finally being set off as Leeds Monthly Meeting in 1813. Subsequently, the meeting has changed names twice: first to Litchfield Monthly (1841) and then to the current-day Winthrop in 1880. Its record of name changes and shifts within the organizational structure of Quaker meetings has been quite complex, reflecting the shifting history of Quakerism in the Kennebec Valley towns of Leeds, Winthrop, Litchfield, and Sidney.
The first meeting for worship in Winthrop (a town immediately east of Leeds) was held under care of Vassalboro Quarter in 1792. This meeting became a preparative meeting ten years later and was set off to Sidney Monthly in the same year. After being transferred to Durham Monthly Meeting as a worship group in 1808, it was set off as part of Leeds Monthly in 1813. Winthrop emerged as a preparative meeting under care of Leeds in 1816. After changing name to Winthrop, the meeting absorbed the defunct Sidney Monthly Meeting in 1932. Pondtown Monthly Meeting was set off from Winthrop in 1983.
The history of quarterly affiliations for Winthrop is similarly complex. Over the years, Winthrop (under its various names) has passed under the care of three different quarterly meetings, beginning with Falmouth (1813), Vassalboro (1813-1841), and Fairfield (1841-1952), before returning to Vassalboro in 1952. It has been a parent of a prolific array of worship groups and preparative meetings.
Winthrop is currently a semi-programmed meeting.
- Augusta Worship Group (ca.1889-1895)
- Augusta Preparative (1895-ca.1920)
- Augusta-Hallowell Preparative (ca.1920-ca.1943)
- Hallowell Worship Group (ca.1833-1839)
- Hallowell Preparative (1839-1852): became Kennebec Preparative
- Hallowell Preparative (1895-ca.1920)
- Kennebec Preparative (1853-1858): became Manchester Preparative
- Leeds Preparative (1813-1848)
- Leeds Worship Group (1848-ca.1873)
- Lewiston Preparative (1813-1816)
- Litchfield Preparative (1813-1880): continued as West Gardiner
- Manchester Preparative (1854-ca.1943)
- Manchester Worship Group (ca.1943-1961)
- New Sharon Worship Group (before 1849-ca.1853)
- Pondtown Worship Group (1982)
- Readfield Worship Group (1890-ca.1891)
- West Gardiner Preparative (1880-ca.1943)
- Wilton Worship Group (1813-1815, 1864-1865)
- Wilton Preparative (1815-1864)
- Winthrop Worship Group (1813-1816)
- Winthrop Preparative (1816-ca.1940)
