Japanese Yearly Meeting Letter

Herbert V. Nicholson (1892-1983), a Quaker missionary, was born in Rochester, NY and later moved to the Philadelphia suburbs. He attended Haverford College in 1910, and began working as a secretary and missionary under Gilbert Bowles in Tokyo, Japan in 1915. In 1920, he married Madeline Waterhouse and had three children. During the Japanese invasion of China, Nicholson left Japan and moved to California in 1939, where he worked as a preacher at the Nisei Congregation (West Los Angeles Community Methodist Church). Nicholson was a vocal opponent of the Japanese internment during the war and would drive hours, helping Japanese families relocate. After the war, he would travel frequently to Japan, bringing thousnds of livestock to help small towns rebound, coining his nickname "Uncle Goat." Later, he published his book in 1982, "Comfort All Who Mourn" about the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

Japanese Yearly Meeting was formally established in 1917, however, Quaker work in Japan began with Philadelphia Friends in 1884. In 1940, the Yearly Meeting joined several other Protestant groups to form the National Christian Church, though a small group of Friends continued to meet separately, from which the new Japanese Yearly Meeting formed in 1947. The denomination runs several organizations and institutes, including Friends Old Folks Home, Friends Girls' School, Tokyo Friends Center, and Sunday School.