The early National WMF meetings were held in June each year.  Bea Steenerson, Clearbrook, Minn., remembers that she “didn’t miss a meeting for years.  We were just so excited to get down to WMF!  And, oh!  You should have heard the singing!”

Eleanor Bjornlie describes the CLB annual conventions of the fifties in Fergus Falls, Minnesota.  “They were smaller and cozier than today.  Whole families attended, and often stayed in homes of the Bethel church families, or in the Hillcrest dormitories, though some stayed in the River Inn, the only hotel in town...It seemed a good time to have a meeting that women could be involved in.”

Within the next several years, various joint mission projects were completed by the women of the new Women’s Missionary Fellowship.

Their first project was to provide furnishings for two new rooms at the Sarepta Home for the Aged in Sauk Centre, Minn., the first Lutheran Brethren Home.  Secondly, they furnished the upstairs apartment of the Mission House in Fergus Falls, Minn., where missionaries stayed during their furloughs. One of the missionaries, Mrs. Erickson, said that she “felt like a new bride coming into such a lovely home.”  Next they provided “brand-new blonde wood furniture” for every room in the Hillcrest girls’ dorm, and “modern sturdy metal furniture” for the boys’ rooms.

One local group, alone, could not have accomplished all of this, but it was made possible by many groups working together.