Biographical Note
Historical Background
Scope and Content
Conditions Governing Access
Conditions Governing Use
Preferred Citation
Related Archival Materials
Processing note
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
USC Libraries Special Collections
Title: Allan A. Hunter papers
creator:
Eddy, Sherwood
creator:
Ford, John Anson
creator:
Lester, Muriel
creator:
Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church
source:
Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church
creator:
United Church of Christ
creator:
Hunter, Allan A. (Allan Armstrong)
Identifier/Call Number: 0397
Identifier/Call Number: 1596
Physical Description:
30.21 Linear Feet
37 boxes
Date (inclusive): 1905-2000
Abstract: Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church, founded in 1905, is located in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles. Its longest-serving
pastor, Allan A. Hunter, led the congregation from 1926 until his retirement in 1963, but stayed actively involved until his
death almost twenty years later. This collection reflects the activities of the church throughout the twentieth century, as
well as the progressive ideas and religious teachings of Reverend Hunter. His correspondence with other religious thinkers
and social activists is included, as well as the manuscripts of most of his sermons throughout the years, which are also included
on audiotapes. The collection presents a vivid picture of Mt. Hollywood Church as well as the man who was at the helm for
so many decades.
Biographical Note
Allan Armstrong Hunter was born in 1893 in Toronto, Canada, the youngest of four children. He came to the United States at
the age of eight, where his family first lived in Colorado before settling in Riverside, California.
Hunter received his A.B. degree from Princeton University in 1916 and then taught for two years in Egypt at Assiut Mission
College. Between 1917 and 1918 he was a YMCA secretary with the British on the Sinai Desert, and then part of the Palestine
unit of the Red Cross during World War I. After the Armistice, Hunter helped direct a large German orphanage in Jerusalem.
He spent several years traveling and studying in India, China, Korea, and Japan-- experiences that would deepen his understanding
of human values the world around and convince him of the waste and futility of war.
In 1923, Hunter married Elizabeth Sterling, the daughter of minister Dr. Hugh K. Walker. Around that same time he graduated
from the Union Theological Seminary in New York and then was ordained a Presbyterian minister and became pastor of Union Church
in Palisade, New Jersey. In 1925 Hunter received his A.M. from Columbia, and then spent time in China with his wife doing
peace work and teaching at the National Normal University.
It was in 1926 that Hunter began a long and notable ministry at Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church in Los Angeles, succeeding
Dr. Edwin P. Ryland, former president of the ACLU--Southern California branch. Through his involvement with the Fellowship
of Reconciliation, the Disciplined Order of Christ, and his many social justice activities, he met and befriended many internationally
known church leaders, humanitarians, and social activists such as Toyohiko Kagawa, Doris and Muriel Lester, Kirby Page, Norman
Cousins, Linus Pauling, Richard Neutra, John Anson Ford, and Aldous Huxley.
A long-time ACLU board member, Hunter was concerned with the constitutional rights of minorities. During and after World
War II, Hunter testified on behalf of the Japanese-Americans who were sent to concentration camps, visiting Manzanar often.
Other topics that Hunter focussed on through his sermons, publications, and activities included world peace, marriage, birth
control (having seen the effects of overpopulation in China and India), labor rights, civil liberties, etc.
Allan and Elizabeth Hunter had two children-- Betsy and Allan, Jr. Reverend Allan Hunter died in 1982, ten years after his
wife Elizabeth. They are buried in Riverside, California where the Reverend's tombstone is inscribed "Christian Life Dedicated
to Peace.".
Historical Background
Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church was founded in 1905, in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles. In 1918, during World War
I, Dr. E.P. Ryland was expelled from the First Methodist Church of Hollywood for his pacifism and became the minister at
Mt. Hollywood. Setting a precedent for the pastor who would follow him, Reverend Ryland was a committed pacifist who supported
workers' rights, labor strikes, and was involved in other civic issues. At its height, the church was comprised of over 600
members.
In 1926, Allan A. Hunter took over as pastor of the church, a role in which he served until his retirement in 1963. The church
counted many progressive-minded civic leaders among its members, including John Anson Ford, chair of the Los Angeles County
Board of Supervisors, after whom Ford Amphitheatre is named. In the 1930s, the church was one of the first congregations
in Los Angeles to be racially integrated. Many notable people, friends of Allan Hunter, preached or spoke at Mt. Hollywood
in its early days. Among the peace activists, philosophers, journalists, diplomats, and other dignitaries who graced Mt.
Hollywood were Ralph Bunche, Cesar Chavez, Gerald Heard, Aldous Huxley, Toyohiko Kagawa, Muriel Lester, Carey McWilliams,
and Howard Thurman among many others.
Because Allan Hunter served as the church's pastor for such a long time-- and was deeply involved in the church's mission
after he retired-- the church's history is inexorably shaped by the passions and activities of the man who took his church
through two world wars, the Korean War, the Viet Nam conflict, and all of the other social and political changes during those
decades. During World War II when Japanese-Americans were being interned in concentration camps, Mt. Hollywood "adopted"
a nearby Japanese-American congregation, Hollywood Independent Church, taking legal ownership of the church to protect and
maintain its property, returning it to its congregation after the war. Some of the congregants and Allan Hunter visited
the Manzanar concentration camp often during that time. In 1947, Mt. Hollywood received a box mailed from Japan, containing
camphor wood from a burnt tree from the yard of a Methodist church which had been destroyed by the atomic bomb dropped on
Hiroshima. The cross was inscribed with "He Is Our Peace" and is still a centerpiece of the church. The church's property
itself was sold in 2012 due to rising costs and a much smaller congregation of about 50 members.
The church's website can be accessed at: http://www.thenewmthollywood.org/MtHCC/Welcome!.html.
Scope and Content
The materials in the Dr. Allan A. Hunter papers span the history of the Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church from pre-World
War I to the 1990s. The bulk of the papers consists of records that were kept during the pastorship of Hunter from the 1920s
through the 1960s, both records and ephemera from the church as well as Hunter's personal correspondence, manuscript materials,
photographs, sermons, subject files, etc. Important subjects covered in photographs, news clippings, and correspondence include
the church's involvement with the Japanese Americans who were interned during World War II, and the church's activities with
orphans and refugees from Europe and Asia after the war.
Conditions Governing Access
Advance notice required for access.
Conditions Governing Use
All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Manuscripts Librarian.
Permission for publication is given on behalf of Special Collections as the owner of the physical items and is not intended
to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained.
Preferred Citation
[Box/folder# or item name], Allan A. Hunter papers, Collection no. 0397, Regional History Collection, Special Collections,
USC Libraries, University of Southern California
Related Archival Materials
American Friends Service Committee Collected Records, Swarthmore College Peace Collection
The Sunday Before Collection, Graduate Theological Union Archives
Processing note
Assistance in processing this collection was provided by Antonio Gonzalez and Tiffany Chu.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Notebooks
Correspondence
Sermons, American -- 20th century -- Archival resources
Pacifists -- United States -- Archival resources
Audiotapes
Notes
Churches -- United States -- History -- Archival resources
Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.) -- Religious life and customs -- Archival resources
Financial records
Churches -- California -- Los Angeles -- History -- Archival resources
Minutes
Books
Reports
Photographs
Ephemera
Churches -- California -- Los Angeles -- Photographs
Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.) -- History -- Archival resources
Japanese Americans -- Evacuation and relocation, 1942-1945 -- Archival resources
Videocassettes
Bunche, Ralph J. (Ralph Johnson) -- Correspondence
Kagawa , Toyohiko -- Archives
Ford, John Anson -- Photographs
Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church
Disciplined Order of Christ -- Archives
Hunter, Elizabeth -- Correspondence
Fellowship of Reconciliation (U.S.) -- Archives
United Church of Christ -- Archives
Hunter, Allan A. (Allan Armstrong) -- Archives
Gandhi, Mahatma -- Archives
Lester, Muriel -- Correspondence
Mt. Hollywood Congregational Church -- Archives
Thurman, Howard -- Archives
Mooney, Thomas J. -- Archives
Fosdick, Harry Emerson -- Archives
Eddy, Sherwood -- Archives