1951: First Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'is of Cienfuegos, Cuba

(The Baha'i World 1950-1954)

Milosh Wurm – The first Baha’i in Czechoslovakia

…Milosh Wurm, the first to become a Baha’i in Czechoslovakia, the first to publish a Baha’i book in Czech language and the first to promote these Teachings in his country. 

(Martha Root, Baha’i News, no. 32, May 1929)

April 21,1950: First Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'is of Berlin re-established after World War II

(The Baha'i World 1950-1954)

1927: Baha’i books were presented to the President of German Republic and other officials during a visit by Martha Root

A letter dated February 20, 1927, from Martha L. Root states that she has visited and given public lectures in sixteen cities in Germany. Shoghi Effendi had told her if she could visit all the Baha’i centres in Germany it would be very good… She was one of the speakers at a Peace Society meeting when five hundred people were present.

“The Promulgation of Universal Peace” was presented to President von Hindenburg of the German Republic. The following letter of thanks was received: 

“The President of the German Republic tenders his best thanks for the book The Promulgation of Universal Peace, which was presented to him. The President has had the book forwarded to the library of the Foreign Office.”

Other Baha’i books were presented to Dr. Gustav Stresemann, chief of the Foreign Office; Dr. Loebe, President of the Reichstag, and books were sent to Mr. Bronislaw Huberman, the great violinist. Mr. Huberman wrote that he would study them.

Miss Root further wrote that she felt there was no city in the world more important for Baha’i teachers to visit than Berlin. If some very scholarly Baha’i teacher could go and live for one year in Berlin as Mirza ’Abul’ Fazl came to the United States, it might mean that a thousand great teachers would eventually go out from Berlin. 

(Baha’i News, no. 19, August 1927)

1927: Third National Baha’i Convention of the Baha’is of the United States and Canada was held in Montreal, Canada

The invitation of the Montreal Spiritual Assembly, extended by them for three successive years, and twice graciously withdrawn in favor of Green Acre and San Francisco, has been gratefully accepted by the National Assembly, and the friends are informed that the Nineteenth Annual Baha’i Convention and Congress will be held in that city during Ridvan. The exact date and other details will be announced at a later time. Meanwhile we should not overlook two significant facts: first, that the forthcoming Convention will be the first held in Canada; and second, that with the fulfilment of the Baha’i number, nineteen, a new spiritual cycle will unfold in the history of the Cause in America. 

(Baha’i News, no. 14. November 1926)

Fall of 1925: The first issue of “The Herald of the South” magazine is published for Australia and New Zealand

From Auckland, New Zealand comes the first issue of a newly established Baha’i magazine for Australia and New Zealand. Its title is “The Herald of the South” and this constructive service on the part of our Australian and New Zealand brothers contains every evidence of wide-spread future success. It is issued by Mrs. A.E. Dewing, 5 Aldred Road, Remuera, Auckland. New Zealand. 

(Baha’i News, no. 8, November 1925)

Summer of 1849 to summer of 1850: “one of the most glorious chapters ever recorded” in the bloodstained history of the Bábí Faith

The… year from the summer of 1849 to the summer of 1850, witnessed a number of signal events in the ministry of the Báb:

• May 1849 had marked the termination of the eleven-month-long Mazindaran upheaval at Shaykh Tabarsi and the martyrdom of Quddus, the last Letter of the Living and the foremost disciple of the Báb.
• Persecution of the Babis erupted with unprecedented ferocity in the opening months of 1850:
• In Tihran occurred the episode of the Seven Martyrs.
• In Yazd, Siyyid Yahyay-i-Darabi (Vahid) became embroiled in agitation against the Faith of the Báb and had to leave, but in Nayriz (in the province of Fars in the south of Persia), he and his companions were surrounded, and fell eventually to treachery on the part of his opponents.
• At Zanjan, in the north, the Shi'ih 'ulama incited the people against the redoubtable Mulla Muhammad Ali (Hujjat), a conflict that was to continue to the end of the year, with an outcome equally tragic.
• Finally, the Báb, Himself, was martyred in July 1850 in Tabriz. 

(Adapted from ‘Baha’u’llah, the King of Glory’, by Hand of the Cause Hassan Balyuzi)

Baha’i community in the United States – as of Sept. 2015

There are about 175,000 Bahá’ís in the United States (less than one percent of the nation’s population), residing in more than 9,000 localities. The makeup of the faith’s adherents is very diverse. The largest communities are in California, Georgia, Illinois, South Carolina, and Texas. There are Bahá’í communities in every state. 

(From ‘Information about the Bahá'í Faith for Funeral Directors’, a document available at US National website)