Warner Clark papers

Table of Contents

Summary Information

Background note

Scope and content note

Administrative Information

Related Materials

Controlled Access Headings

Collection Inventory

Warner Clark

Clark Family Genealogy

Family, Friends, Associates, and Miscellaneous Materials

Summary Information

Repository

Historical Society of Pennsylvania

Creator

Clark, Warner, 1912-

Title

Warner Clark papers

ID

3219

Date

1925-2007, undated

Extent

5.1 Linear feet ; 15 boxes

Author

Finding aid prepared by Susan Kearney.

Language

English

Abstract

William Warner Clark was born in Philadelphia in 1912, and he died in California in 2007. From 1943 to 1945, he served in the U.S. Army, where he graduated from Officer Candidate School and served as aide to General George A. Horkan. Clark worked as an air conditioner salesman and later as an accountant, but his main work through most of his adult life was for the international religious movement Moral Re-Armament, founded by Frank Buchman, and its offshoot, Up With People. The collection documents Clark's life, work, and family, and the Moral Re-Armament movement and related initiatives over some eighty years. It includes correspondence, photographs, official documents such as marriage and death certificates, scrapbooks, clippings, essays and other writings, printed materials (including Clark's 2005 memoir, Our World on Our Watch), notebooks and address books, and various small artifacts such as military ribbons.

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Background note

William Warner Clark was born in Philadelphia in 1912. He attended Germantown Friends School and the University of Pennsylvania. From 1943 to 1945, he served in the U.S. Army, where he graduated from Officer Candidate School and served as aide to General George A. Horkan. In 1951, Clark married Dorothy Jane Saul (1920-2006); in 2007, he married Gladys L. Nichols Taylor. Clark worked as an air-conditioner salesman and later as an accountant. But most of his adult life was centered on his volunteer efforts with Moral Re-Armament and its offshoot, Up With People. In his work for these organizations, he performed a number of different roles and traveled to many countries in Europe and Africa. Warner Clark died in Fortuna, California in 2007.

William Warner Clark was an active member of the Moral Re-Armament (MRA) movement for much of his life. The movement was founded in 1938 in response to the post-World War I military rearmament by many countries during the 1930s. Frank Buchanan, a native Pennsylvanian and Christian minister, was a central member of the Oxford Group in England; he founded MRA as a moral and spiritual group focused on political and social issues. The group’s core beliefs centered on four absolute principles: absolute honesty, absolute purity, absolute unselfishness, and absolute love.

After World War II, the group procured a derelict hotel in Caux, Switzerland that served as its European headquarters. In the United States, the group procured land on Mackinac Island, Michigan where annual conferences were held. As a means of fundraising and spreading their message, for about 50 years, the group sponsored and produced plays and musicals. Among the titles were The Drug Story Revolution,  The Good Road,  Sing Out 65,  You Can Defend America,  We Are Tomorrow, and the most famous,  Up With People.

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Scope and content note

As documented in his autobiography, Our World on Our Watch (2005), most of Warner Clark’s personal life intertwines with his life-long commitment to MRA. The collection documents his life, work, family, and the Moral Re-Armament movement and its related initiatives over some eighty years. Some attempt has been made to group the collection into personal memorabilia, genealogical matter, and materials related to family, friends, and MRA. Series one is  Warner Clark, Series two is the  Clark Family Genealogy, and Series three is  Family Friends, Associates, and Miscellaneous. The entire collection is 15 boxes and spans from 1924-2007. Researchers will find that the line between Warner Clark’s personal life and work with MRA often could not be clearly separated. For example, many of the letters and photographs are both personal and MRA-related in content. Letters have been arranged chronologically. Photographs were donated in a filing drawer and this order has been retained. In addition to many letters and photographs covering much of his life and travels, the collection includes official documents such as marriage and death certificates, scrapbooks, clippings, essays and other writings, notebooks, address books, and various small artifacts such as military ribbons. Printed materials (Box 14) include several books by members of MRA or about MRA including  Our World on Our Watch by Warner Clark,  Stepping Stones: A German Biography by Hansjorg Gareis,  Annie by Annie Jaegar, and  Frank Buchman as I Knew Him by H.W. Austin.

Researchers interested in Warner Clark’s genealogy should consult HSP Collection #3996, Charles Heber Clark papers. Charles Heber Clark (1841-1915) is William Warner Clark’s grandfather.

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Administrative Information

Publication Information

 Historical Society of Pennsylvania ; 2016.

Restrictions

The collection is open for research.

Provenance

Gift of Gladys L. Taylor-Clark, 2009.

Accession number 2009.055.

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Related Materials

Related materials

At the Historical Society of Pennsylvania:

Charles Heber Clark papers (Collection 3996)

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Controlled Access Headings

Corporate Name(s)

• Moral Re-armament (Organization).

Genre(s)

• Photographs.

Geographic Name(s)

• Philadelphia (Pa.)--Social life and customs--20th century.

Personal Name(s)

• Saul, Dorothy Jane, 1920-2009.
• Taylor-Clark, Gladys L.

Subject(s)

• Family life--Pennsylvania--Philadelphia.
• Genealogy.
• Personal Correspondence.

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Collection Inventory