Friends are answering the call from sovereign Indigenous communities, researching and acknowledging Friends’ roles in Indian Boarding Schools, toward acts of righting relations with Native Nations’ Peoples – those on whose land we benefit. A network of Friends, east coast to Alaska, have found unity in forming the Quaker Indian Boarding School (QIBS) Research Group and have written a 2025 QIBS Epistle. Initiator and facilitator of both Salem Quarter IAC and PYM First Contact Reconciliation Collaborative participates in the QIBS research and is an epistle signatory. Thoughtful responses may be submitted to FCRC via emailing SacredWovenWord@yahoo.com.

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April 18, 2025

Dear Friends in U.S. and Canada Yearly Meetings,

We write to you as a group of U.S. Quakers who formed the Quakers and ‘Indian Boarding Schools’ Research Network (QIBS) in late 2022. Our collective purpose is to thoroughly research 19th-century Quaker involvement in assimilationist boarding schools, and to make our findings accessible to Native American families and tribes and to the Religious Society of Friends.

Native Americans call us to this work as they seek answers to the question, “What happened to our children?” We share our research findings with the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition (NABS), the Native American Rights Fund (NARF) and the tribes, and we seek guidance from Native elders, past and present.

We come to this work through spiritual leadings and carry it out through collective
discernment. Most of us conduct our QIBS work with spiritual accompaniment, including committees of our yearly or monthly meetings. The Toward Right Relationship with Native Peoples program of Friends Peace Teams provides technical and programmatic support. We believe that for Friends to build positive relationships with Native communities today, we need to examine our shared history with open minds and hearts. QIBS members apply rigorous research standards to this task. We also listen lovingly to the testimonies of both Native people and Friends as they speak to us through historical documents and through our interactions today.

We hear cries of grief and anger from Native communities whose young people were taken away and taught to reject their entire way of life – their languages, cultures, and spiritual practices. We hear the earnest desire of our Quaker forebears to offer the perceived benefits of the European-American Christian way of life to Native people by means of assimilation. We hear from Native people today who express gratitude for these benefits, including those who became Quakers. At the same time, many continue to feel acute pain and grief. We hear Native and human rights organizations define the assimilationist programs of the boarding schools as cultural genocide. And we see how Native communities are working to heal these deep wounds by teaching their languages, revitalizing their cultures, and defending their sovereignty.

Quakers can support Native-led healing processes, and some monthly and yearly meetings are already doing this. We invite you to learn about the efforts of Alaska Friends Conference, Baltimore Yearly Meeting, and New England Yearly Meeting (included in the Resources below). Other meetings are supporting Indigenous language education programs, Land Back projects, and legislation to create a U.S. Truth and Healing Commission. We are encouraged by these Friendly acts of conscience and pray that they will multiply in the coming years.

We invite you to join us in considering these queries:
• How are we learning the history of Quakers’ interactions with Native peoples from various points of view?
• What might right relationship with Native peoples look like in our meetings and communities today?

Thank you, Friends. Please hold our Quakers and ‘Indian Boarding Schools’ Research Network in your hearts and your prayers as we seek to be faithful to our callings. We send warm greetings and good wishes as you gather together, and we entrust you to the transforming love and power of the Spirit that unites and guides us. Let us see what love can do.

In Faith and Friendship,

Taylor Brelsford, Santa Fe Meeting, Intermountain Yearly Meeting
Gordon Bugbee, Beacon Hill Meeting, New England Yearly Meeting, NEYM Quaker Indigenous
Boarding Schools Research Group
Beth Burbank, Northside Friends Meeting, Chicago; Member, Racial Equity and Education
Committee, Illinois Yearly Meeting
Elizabeth Cazden, New England Yearly Meeting, NEYM Quaker Indigenous Boarding Schools
Research Group
Elizabeth Claggett-Borne, New England Yearly Meeting, representative to Friends Peace Teams
Julie M. Finch, 15th Street Meeting, New York Yearly Meeting
Andrew Palmer Grant (MLIS), Quaker Indigenous Boarding School Research Group and Right
Relations Resource Group of ‘New England’ Yearly Meeting
Janet Hough, Cobscook & Three Rivers Meeting, New England Yearly Meeting, NEYM Quaker
Indigenous Boarding Schools Research Group
Terrence F. Kayser, Minneapolis Meeting, Northern Yearly Meeting
Paula Keeth, South Central Yearly Meeting
Art Koeninger, Homer Alaska Meeting, Alaska Quakers Seeking Right Relationship Committee of
Alaska Friends Conference
Merrill Kohlhofer, North Shore Meeting, New England Yearly Meeting
Max Lockwood, 15th Street Meeting, New York Yearly Meeting
sandra boone Murphy, First Contact Reconciliation Collaborative, Philadelphia Yearly Meeting
Judy Lumb, Atlanta Meeting
John Meyer, Friends Meeting of Washington DC, Baltimore Yearly Meeting, BYM Indigenous
Affairs Committee
Pamela Moore, Pittsburgh Friends Meeting, Lake Erie Yearly Meeting
Daniel Patrick Morrison, 15th Street Meeting, New York Yearly Meeting, Recording Clerk of
NYYM Indigenous Affairs Committee
Paula Palmer, Boulder Meeting, Boulder Meeting’s Indigenous Peoples Concerns Committee,
Intermountain Yearly Meeting, Co-Director of Toward Right Relationship with Native Peoples,
Friends Peace Teams
Mary J. Parish, Pittsburgh Meeting, Lake Erie Yearly Meeting
Suzanna Schell, Beacon Hill/Three Rivers Meetings, New England Yearly Meeting, clerk of
NEYM’s Right Relationship Resource Group
Terri Whitesong, friend of Friends
Note: We welcome correspondence at this email address:
coordinator@qibs-research.info

Resources

This document includes a list of the Quaker-operated Indigenous boarding schools and other Quaker documents, reports, and videos (including actions taken by yearly meetings).
We welcome interested Friends to join us if they would like to be actively engaged in this research. Contact us at coordinator@qibs-research.info.
To learn about the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, visit this website. To learn about the role of the federal government, read these reports by the U.S. Department of the Interior:
• Volume 1
• Volume 2

To learn about the role of other religious denominations and how they are holding themselves accountable, see:
• November 2024 webinar: “Toward Truth and Healing: How Churches Face Accountability for their Indian Boarding Schools”
• Resources on Churches’ Actions Toward Accountability

To advocate for a Truth and Healing Commission on the Indian Boarding Schools, visit this website.