ian doctor, named Ibrahim _Kh_ayru'llah, who, while residing in
Cairo, had been converted by Haji 'Abdu'l-Karim-i-Tihrani to the Faith,
had received a Tablet from Baha'u'llah, had communicated with
'Abdu'l-Baha, and reached New York in December 1892, established his
residence in Chicago, and began to teach actively and systematically the
Cause he had espoused. Within the space of two years he had communicated
his impressions to 'Abdu'l-Baha, and reported on the remarkable success
that had attended his efforts. In 1895 an opening was vouchsafed to him in
Kenosha, which he continued to visit once a week, in the course of his
teaching activities. By the following year the believers in these two
cities, it was reported, were counted by hundreds. In 1897 he published
his book, entitled the Babu'd-Din, and visited Kansas City, New York City,
Ithaca and Philadelphia, where he was able to win for the Faith a
considerable number of supporters. The stout-hearted Thornton Chase,
surnamed _Th_abit (Steadfast) by 'Abdu'l-Baha and designated by Him "the
first American believer," who became a convert to the Faith in 1894, the
immortal Louisa A. Moore, the mother teacher of the West, surnamed Liva
(Banner) by 'Abdu'l-Baha, Dr. Edward Getsinger, to whom she was later
married, Howard MacNutt, Arthur P. Dodge, Isabella D. Brittingham, Lillian
F. Kappes, Paul K. Dealy, Chester I. Thacher and Helen S. Goodall, whose
names will ever remain associated with the first stirrings of the Faith of
Baha'u'llah in the North American continent, stand out as the most
prominent among those who, in those early years, awakened to the call of
the New Day, and consecrated their lives to the service of the newly
proclaimed Covenant.

By 1898 Mrs. Phoebe Hearst, the well-known philanthropist (wife of Senator
George F. Hearst), whom Mrs. Getsinger had, while on a visit to
California, attracted to the Faith, had expressed her intention of
visiting 'Abdu'l-Baha in the Holy Land, had invited several believers,
among them Dr. and Mrs. Getsinger, Dr. _Kh_ayru'llah and his wife, to join
her, and had completed the necessary arrangements for their historic
pilgrimage to Akka. In Paris several resident Americans, among whom were
May Ellis Bolles, whom Mrs. Getsinger had won over to the Faith, Miss
Pearson, and Ann Apperson, both nieces of Mrs. Hearst, with Mrs.
Thornburgh and her daughter, were added to the party, the number of which
was later swelled in Egypt by the ad