The 8th Quadrennial Assembly of the Asian Church Women’s Conference (ACWC) was held from 2-7 November 1986 in Bangkok, Thailand, and unfortunately the archives of Australian Church Women (ACW) hold very little on the participation of our members in this assembly.
There was actually much to report, especially the election of Mrs Barbara Grealy of South Australia to the office of Vice-president; the keynote speaker was Mrs Janet Wood, the Executive Officer of the South Australian Council of Churches; and Mrs Christine Fensham of Melbourne led one of the Commissions.* However, the assembly took place after the last ACW newsletter for the year and between the biennial National Conferences of ACW, so it was old news before it could be reported.
To make matters worse, there is only one photo from this assembly in our ACW national archives. It shows the newly elected officers and national representatives of the member countries with the ACWC Executive Secretary. And there are no photos in the ACWC records, except for a couple of washed-out grey photocopy images printed in the report of the assembly proceedings.
A very sad state of affairs, and I am hoping that one of our members or one of our unit archives can supply additional records, particularly photos. I especially appeal to our sisters of the ACWC who may have access to records of this assembly in their archives or belonging to past members.
We do have a copy of the notice from Dorothy Haensel, the ACW National President, from the October 1986 ACW newsletter advising the upcoming ACWC assembly.
* The high proportion of Australian speakers at this assembly occurred because it was initially planned to be held in Australia, but the final projected costs exceeded the assembly budget. Thailand offered to host the event once this was realised.
Request
If you have any records of the 1986 ACWC Assembly, it would be much appreciated if you would forward me a copy at donna.bryan@salvationarmy.org.au
