History Of Methodist Reform, Volume I - Media Sabda Org

While the various enterprises already alluded to were being so successfully inaugurated at
Nagoya, the work under the management of brother Colhouer and his associates at Yokohama was
making steady progress. Among other evidences of permanent growth a new church, costing 83000,
was built, which still serves the purposes of the mission in that city.
Miss Margaret Brown, who had conducted the girls' school for the Woman's Society after the
retirement of Miss Brittain, was compelled to return to America in February, 1887, on account of
ill-health. The school, however, was carried on successfully by Miss Crittenden and Mr. Klein, until
the departure of the latter to Nagoya, when it was placed in charge of a Mr. Elmer, pending the
arrival of new missionaries.
In August, 1889, the missionary force was again recruited by the arrival of Rev. A. H. Morgan.
He was stationed at Yokohama, and in the ensuing autumn placed at the head of the boys' school,
Miss Crittenden, who for more than two years had served in this position, returning to America, her
term having expired. Mr. Morgan's experience as an instructor, acquired during his professorship in
Yadkin College, North Carolina, standing him to good purpose it was not long before the school
began to show signs of growth and increased usefulness.
The term of Mr. Klein having expired and signs of failing health suggesting the need of a brief
respite from toil, the work at Nagoya was given temporarily in charge of Mr. Albright and Mr.
Mainyama, and he returned, in September, 1888, to his home in Baltimore Md. He remained in the
home land about fifteen months his visit, however, was turned to good account in several ways for
the work to which he had given five years of faithful service. Early in March, 1890, he returned to
Japan under a contract for eight years.
In the following July a meeting of all the missionaries, including native pastors, was called, and
an organization, designated as the "Annual Missionaries' Meeting," was effected for the purpose of
formulating plans for concerted effort in developing all departments of the work. Plans ware made
at this meeting for holding monthly business meetings at each of the mission stations, reports of
which were to be regularly forwarded to the Board. A Ministerial Education Society was also formed
and measures were adopted to raise funds to assist such worthy young men from among the native
students as might feel called to the work of the ministry.
At the second annual meeting, in July, 1891, it appearing to all the missionaries that the work had
advanced sufficiently to justify the formation of an organization with larger powers, a memorial was
prepared and addressed to the General Conference, petitioning for authority to organize an annual
conference and for the enactment of suitable regulations for its government. This petition was readily
granted in May, 1892, by the General Conference, then in session at Westminster, Md., and on the
15th of the following September the Japan Annual Conference of the Methodist Protestant Church
was duly organized, with F. C. Klein as President and A. H. Morgan, Secretary. Owing to the
expiration of the terms of Dr. Colhouer and Mr. Albright, and their return to America in the early
part of the year, the membership of the Conference at the start was quite small; but the admission
and ordination of Rev. G. Maruyama and the accession of five Japanese preachers on probation
placed at the disposal of the executive laborers enough before the close of the session to supply nine