Dorothy Beecher Baker

Dorothy Beecher Baker (December 21, 1898 - January 10, 1954) was a member of the group termed the Hands of the Cause of God who were a select group of Bahá'ís, appointed for life, whose main function was to propagate and protect the Bahá'í Faith. Unlike the members of the elected institutions and other appointed institutions in the Bahá'í Faith, who serve in those offices, Hands are considered to have achieved a distinguished rank in service to the religion. Baker was among those in the first contingent, appointed 24 December 1951 by Shoghi Effendi, then head of the religion.

Baker was distantly related to Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin.

At the age of 13 years, her grandmother, a Bahá'í, took her to New York to see 'Abdu’l-Bahá who was then on an extended trip to the West. About on her 15th birthday she took official steps to be recognized as a Bahá'í. She went to college at New Jersey State Normal School at Montclair where she graduated in 1918 as a teacher and was employed by the Newark school system. In June 1921 she married Frank Baker who had two children and in 1922 she had an additional daughter and a son in 1923. In 1926 she was first elected to the Bahá'í Local Spiritual Assembly of Buffalo NY where they then lived. The family moved to Lima, Ohio in 1927 and in 1928 she was a delegate to the national convention following which she dedicated herself more to the service of the religion. She was first elected to the National Spiritual Assembly in 1937.

Baker participated in leadership roles in several initiatives of the Bahá'ís before World War II. Among the two highest priority were undertaking `Abdu'l-Bahá's call through the Tablets of the Divine Plan to spread the religion throughout Latin and South America and addressing racism in America. Baker was named chair of the Inter-America Committee of the Bahá'í National Spiritual Assembly of the US, responsible for many aspects of an initiative of the religion to spread the religion into Latin and South America and in 1939 she was also appointed by the national assembly to the Race Unity Committee along with Louis George Gregory which she chaired from 1941–44 when she also served on the Bahá'í National Spiritual Assembly of the United States and Canada on which she ultimately served sixteen years. The committee stressed the role of education and culture, gave parents recommendations for educating their children in the spirit of racial equality, and encouraged the study of African American culture.

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