Baptist women in America: in various times in Baptist history in America, women have served as church planters, missionaries, mission organization leaders, deaconesses, deacons, worship leaders, preachers, exhorters, and spiritual advisors.

These women have contributed much to their local churches and communities. Yet until recent years, the work of Baptist women was rely recorded. Baptist historians did not preserve women's experiences or record their thoughts or reflections. Leon McBeth once observed, "Most of these historians simply ignored women. They did not say anything bad about them; they did not say anything at all about them." (1)

Since the early 1970s, however, Baptist historians have turned their attention to the lives and contributions of Baptist women. My own interest in the topic of women in Baptist history led me last year to pull together a list of writings about Baptist women. I discovered that since 1970 more than one hundred books and articles have been written about Baptist women in general, and hundreds more books and articles have been written about specific Baptist women. The length of my bibliography confirmed for me that there truly is a growing interest in women's history.

Included in that bibliography are many articles published in this journal. During the past thirty-five years, Baptist History & Heritage has published at least twenty-seven articles on women, and two journal issues (January 1977 and July 1987) focused on women in Baptist life. Much work has been done on this vital topic, and yet more work still needs to be done.

Given the popularity and the importance of the topic, the officers of the Baptist History and Heritage Society voted to dedicate the 2005 annual meeting to the topic "Women in Baptist History" and to issue an open call for papers. Nearly forty paper proposals were submitted, and twenty-eight were accepted and subsequently presented at our meeting held in Birmingham, Alabama. Many of these papers will be published in this and the Winter 2006 issue of Baptist History & Heritage. This Summer/Fall 2005 issue contains papers relating to Baptist women in America, and the Winter 2006 issue will include papers relating to Baptist women around the world.

In this issue, Sarah Frances Anders, longtime observer and recorder of work relating to Baptist women in ministry, offers an overview of the roles of Baptist women in the last fifty years. Patricia A. Bancroft, pastor of the First Seventh Day Baptist Church of Alfred, New York, explores the lives of women pastors in the Seventh Day Baptist denomination. Pamela Smoot, Wilson Fallin, and Jaquelyn S. Henderson present the work of African American Baptist women in various cities. Charles Deweese traces key developments and trends relating to Baptist women deacons and deaconesses. Richard Traylor, Wm. Loyd Allen, and Kendal P. Mobley explore the work of specific Baptist women in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Also included is Steve Hollaway's 2005 award-winning Baptist Heritage sermon, "Remember That You Were Slaves."

(1.) H. Leon McBeth, "Perspectives on Women in Baptist Life," Baptist History and Heritage 22, no. 3 (July 1987): 10.

Pamela R. Durso

Editor