Name Joan Fry | Siblings Roger Fry | |
Died November 25, 1955, London, United Kingdom | ||
Joan Mary Fry (27 July 1862 – 25 November 1955) was an English Quaker campaigner for peace and social reform.
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Early life
Joan Fry was born on 27 July 1862 in London, into a wealthy family of Quakers. She was the daughter of a judge, Sir Edward Fry and his wife, Mariabella Hodgkin (1833 – 1930), and sister of art critic Roger Fry who was a member of the avant-garde Bloomsbury Group.
Work
During the First World War, she served as a Quaker Prison Chaplain and helped men who had a conscientious objection to war at their tribunal and in prison. In 1919, she and other Friends travelled to the now-defeated Germany and organised food distribution networks as famine relief there. Seven years later, Fry returned to the United Kingdom in 1926 where she further worked to relieve poverty and unemployment.
She gave the 1910 Swarthmore Lecture, entitled The Communion of Life to the Quakers' "London Yearly Meeting".
The Royal Mail's "Britons of Distinction" postage stamps - issued on 23 February 2012 - celebrated ten people from the world of science and technology, architecture, politics and the arts. One of them features Joan Mary Fry.
Personal life
When her sister in law Helen Coombe, was institutionalised, she helped her brother Roger with bringing up their children.
Death
Fry died in London on 25 November 1955.
Joan Mary Fry's publications
as listed in the catalogue of the Library of the Religious Society of Friends, London [2]
'Papers in collections'