On Saturday, September 18, the Museum welcomed Benefactors and Life Members to a premiere screening of The Onward and Upward Chain. Over a hundred guests gathered in the Longyear Portrait Gallery, where paintings from the Museum’s collection of some of the pioneering early workers featured in the video were specially exhibited for the occasion.
Writer, producer, director Web Lithgow introduced the production: “Longyear’s collections are a gold mine full of nuggets — letters, reminiscences, scrapbooks and artifacts — all of which exist because Longyear exists.…It is so important for Christian Scientists today to be able to learn the stories of all these early workers — ordinary people accomplishing extraordinary things and setting an example for us all.…At one point we made contact with the granddaughter of one of the figures in the film. In a note she said, ‘You are doing a marvelous work getting the precious history recorded. Generations to come will thank you, just as the present ones love the reports of the early workers.’”
This article was originally published in the 2004 fall Report to Members.