Samantha Knox Condit (August 27, 1837 – August 18, 1912) was an American teacher and Presbyterian missionary, working in the Chinese community of San Francisco, California and surroundings.
Early life Samantha Davis Knox (known as "Mansie") was born in Hollidays Cove, West Virginia, the daughter of Andrew Knox and Elizabeth Knox.Mary Ferguson and Mary Campbell Bowman, "The History of Hollidays Cove: A New Ferry Established in the Cove" Weirton Daily Times (January 2, 1974): 6. via Newspapers.com She trained as a teacher at Steubenville Female Seminary in Ohio."Samantha Knox Condit" The Assembly Herald (October 1912): 541.
Career Samantha Knox taught English at the Steubenville Female Seminary for fourteen years after her graduation from the same school. As Mrs. Condit, she worked with her husband as an American Presbyterian missionary in the Chinese community of San Francisco, California from 1872 until she died in 1912.Guide to the Condit Family Papers, Presbyterian Historical Society. She began and presided over the Occidental Board of Foreign Missions from her own home in its first months."Missions; First Regular Meeting of the Pacific Branch" Los Angeles Times (January 9, 1889): 2. via Newspapers.com She helped to found a rescue home for Chinese women in San Francisco, later called the Donaldina Cameron House after Donaldina Cameron."Noted Mission Worker Dies After Long Career" San Francisco Examiner (August 20, 1912): 3. via Newspapers.com In 1888, she attended the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as a delegate representing the Woman's Missionary Society."A Chinese Scholar" The Record-Argus (March 19, 1900): 1. via Newspapers.com She organized activities for women and children at the Chinese Presbyterian Church in San Francisco, where her husband was the pastor, and taught Bible classes.Christopher Viboon Chua, "The Sacredness of Being There: Race, Religion, and Place-Making at San Francisco’s Presbyterian Church in Chinatown" (Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Berkeley 2014): 33. "Mrs. Condit has been engaged in the work in the Chinese quarter for the past twenty-six years, and makes a house-to-house visitation each week," explained a 1998 report."King's Daughters Entertainment in the Chinese Church" San Francisco Examiner (October 15, 1998): 3. via Newspapers.com
Samantha Knox Condit was also involved in temperance work, as in 1882, when she presented a petition to the mayor of Oakland from the women of the city, demanding that saloons be kept closed on Sundays."The Women of Oakland" Oakland Tribune (April 17, 1882): 3. via Newspapers.com
Personal life Samantha Knox traveled to California in 1871 to stay with her brother William.Mary Ferguson and Mary Campbell Bowman, "The History of Hollidays Cove: Samantha Finds Romance in California" Weirton Daily Times (January 11, 1974): 4. via Newspapers.com She married an old friend, the Rev. Ira Miller Condit (1833-1915), in 1872, and helped to raise his children from his first marriage. Samantha Knox Condit died in Oakland, California in 1912, after a long illness, aged 74 years."Death of Mrs. Condit" Woman's Work (November 1912): 254. Ng Poon Chew was one of the pastors assisting at her funeral service.
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