Women’s Leadership and Involvement in Adventist History Explored in New Podcast
19 March 2025 |
The Adventist Learning Community is shining a spotlight on the often-overlooked female leadership involved in the Seventh-day Adventist Church through its new podcast, They Also Served: Stories of Adventist Women.
The title and theme of the podcast are drawn from a book, They Also Served, written by Ava Covington Wall nearly 80 years after the founding of the Adventist Church. Published in 1940 by the Review and Herald Publishing Association, the book highlights the foundational role of women who helped pioneer the movement.
In an article for the Adventist Review, the show’s producer, Heather Moor, shares the following:
“Out of print for more than 80 years, this now-elusive book offers just a glimpse of the many women involved in the early Adventist denomination. Many more stories remain largely lost to time as generation after generation fades, their memories—and history—lost with them.”
Other than Ellen G. White, the contributions of these women have been largely forgotten or dismissed. However, through the podcast, host and historian Heidi Olson Campbell seeks to amplify their legacy. Dr. Campbell, who teaches in Maryland, has dedicated much of her academic career to studying the impact of religion and politics on perceptions of gender roles in early modern Europe. Her dissertation explored how exemplars for women changed in religious rhetoric during the English Reformation, specifically focusing on Paul’s cross sermons.
Her expertise makes her uniquely qualified to uncover the forgotten stories of women who played crucial roles in the development of the church, particularly in leadership.
Moor says:
“These women were poets, educators, doctors, abolitionists, missionaries, writers, preachers, social reformers, and Bible instructors—women such as Charlotte Blake, among the first Black female doctors in the United States; Alma McKibbin, who defied a tragic diagnosis to become one of Adventism’s most influential Bible instructors, regardless of gender; Sojourner Truth, the famous abolitionist and activist, who was also a Millerite with close ties with Adventism; and Lucy Post, Georgia Burrus Burgess, and Anna Knight, among the first single women from the United States to serve as missionaries abroad.”
The influence of these women will be explored in each of the 12 episodes of Season 1, which premiered on March 7 on all platforms.
