Joshua Rowntree

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Joshua Rowntree (6 April 1844 – 10 February 1915) was elected Member of Parliament (MP) for Scarborough in 1886 and served, as a Gladstonian Liberal, until 1892, when he was succeeded by the Conservative, Sir George Reresby Sitwell, whom he had defeated in 1886.

He was an active Quaker. After he left Parliament, in 1892, he 'gave himself with whole heart and mind to the modern interpretation of Quakerism'. He took a quiet part in enabling British Friends to come to terms with scientific discoveries and biblical criticism and with shaking off outdated customs—notably through the Manchester conference (1895), Scarborough summer school (1897), and the establishment in 1903 of a study centre at Woodbrooke, Birmingham.

He gave the Swarthmore Lecture in 1913 under the title Social Service - its place in the Society of Friends.

[edit] Joshua Rowntree's publications

Opium habit in the East: A study of the evidence given to the Royal Commission on Opium, 1893-94. P. S. King & Son: Westminster, 1895.
Applied Christianity and War. An address. [c. 1904.]
The imperial drug trade. Methuen, [1905?]
Social Service, its place in the Society of Friends. (Series: Swarthmore Lectures) Headley Bros.: London, 1913.

[edit] Source

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography article by Edward H. Milligan, 'Rowntree, Joshua (1844–1915)', Sept 2004; online edn, May 2006 [1], accessed 30 Dec 2006.

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by Sir George Sitwell	Member of Parliament for Scarborough 1886–1892	Succeeded by Sir George Sitwell

Persondata
NAME	Rowntree, Joshua
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Politician and social reformer
DATE OF BIRTH	April 6, 1844
PLACE OF BIRTH	Scarborough, Yorkshire
DATE OF DEATH	February 10, 1915
PLACE OF DEATH	Scalby