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Brenda to Speak at Sacred Heart of Mary Book Club
Sacred Heart of Mary Catholic Church Book/Movie Discussion Group will be hosting Brenda on Wednesday August 14, 2024 at 6:30 in the Parish Hall, located at 51841 Leach Road, Dowagiac, MI 49047.
Brenda will be speaking about her father's work with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. during the 1960s.
Brenda Walker Beadenkopf is the author of A Quaker Behind the Dream, a two-volume biography of her father Charles Walker, a pacifist Quaker and expert in nonviolence. He worked with Dr. Martin Luther King in the Civil Rights Movement helping with nonviolence training and writing training materials.
A Quaker historian, she has researched the history of her Quaker church, Penn Friends, of the Quakers in the area such as James E. Bonine, and her own Quaker ancestors, the Walkers of Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.
Chief Leopold Pokagon and his tribe of Potawatomi Indians built a log church here in 1838 and deeded the forty acres of land on which it stood to the Catholic Bishop of Detroit. Pokagon, who came to Silver Creek Township from his village outside of nearby Niles, was buried on this site in 1841. During the early 1840s the Holy Cross Fathers of Notre Dame in Indiana ministered to the Indians.The white frame church built in 1861 burned in 1886 and was immediately replaced by this present structure.
Books will be available, and refreshments will be served.
Middle School Underground Railroad Docents
Will and Brenda, as members of the Board of the Underground Railroad Society of Cass County, Michigan, were tour guides
twice in April to give area elementary students a visit to the past at the Bonine House Carriage House on M-60, Cassopolis. First was a group of about 100 Second Graders from Elkhart, and then a few days later, 66 Fifth Graders from Sam Adams Elementary visited.
The Sam Adams fifth graders also participated in a bus trip to the sites of the Kentucky Raid of 1847 which took place in this very area. Students learned how Quakers and others in the communities of Cassopolis and Vandalia sent away empty-handed Kantucky slave catchers who had attempted to recapture at least nine Freedom Seekers staying on local farms.
July 25 and 27
QUAKERS IN TWO CENTURIES IN CELEBRATION OF SADSBURY FRIENDS (QUAKER) MEETING'S 300TH ANNIVERSARY
BRENDA WALKER BEADENKOPF PRESENTS: QUAKERS IN TWO CENTURIES
PART 1 --- Her Quaker Ancestors in the 1850s and '60s: Sadsbury Meeting and the Underground Railroad, Thursday July 25, Christiana Historical Society (6PM) *Note
PART 2 --- Her Philadelphia Quaker father in the 1950s and '60s: Charles Coates Walker worked with Dr. Martin Luther King, July 27, Sadsbury Friends Meeting (10AM)
Along with celebrating George Fox's 400th Birthday in July of 1624
August 14:
“My Dad and Dr. King” Wednesday, 6:30pm, Sacred Heart of Mary Book Discussion Group. 51841 Leach Road, Dowagiac, MI 49047 (Set up Tri-fold weekend before at Church)
September 18:
“What Did the Quakers Do After Abolition?” Wednesday, 10-11am. Council on Aging, Dowagiac Branch, Front Street.
Edward Lowe and Front Street Crossing Senior Center Speaker
This past March, Brenda and Will accomplished a two-part talk at the local Councils on Aging, otherwise known as the local Senior Centers. On March 11, with Will running the power point, Brenda spoke with her power point presentation on the subject, "My Dad and Dr. King." She brought her tri-fold exhibit, "Did the Civil Rights Movement Just Happen? No!" to the Front Street Crossing
She spoke two days later on March 13 at the Ed Lowe Center in Cassopolis, Michigan, on the same subject and with the power point and tri-fold. There was a good crowd both places, and they both got a free lunch in Cass.