31 Facts About Talitha Gerlach

Talitha A Gerlach was an American YWCA worker who spent most of her life as a social worker in Shanghai, China, where she died.

Talitha Gerlach received various awards from the Shanghai and Chinese governments.

Talitha Gerlach was born in Pittsburgh, to a family of German origin.

Talitha Gerlach was the daughter of a Methodist minister and spent her childhood near Columbia, Ohio.

Talitha Gerlach earned a bachelor's degree in social economics at the North Western Christian University in 1920.

Talitha Gerlach intended to go into social work and joined the campus branch of the YWCA.

Talitha Gerlach began work with the YWCA traveling in the Mid-West of the United States.

That year Talitha Gerlach joined a political study group in Shanghai with progressive foreigners such as Rewi Alley, Agnes Smedley and George Hatem.

Talitha Gerlach came to the conclusion that the sincere, capable and forward-looking Communists were best able to change China from a poor country oppressed by foreigners into a strong, wealthy and independent nation.

Talitha Gerlach thought that YWCA training would help women become leaders during and after the coming Communist revolution.

Alley and Talitha Gerlach contacted progressive organizations in China and campaigned to improve social, political and economic conditions.

Talitha Gerlach was concerned about the practice of binding the feet of women and children in China, which she called inhumane and a perversion of beauty.

Talitha Gerlach worked at the YWCA headquarters in Shanghai for most of the 1930s.

Talitha Gerlach became involved with the Communist Party and the "national salvation" groups led by students opposed to Chiang Kai-shek's right-wing policies and efforts to appease Japan.

In 1938 Talitha Gerlach joined the China Defense League organized by Soong Ching-ling, the widow of Sun Yat-sen She helped smuggle money and medical aid to parts of China that had not been occupied and to the Chinese Communists and other group opposed to the Japanese.

Talitha Gerlach used her position as a non-belligerent foreigner in Japanese-occupied Shangai to smuggle supplies and money to the resistance.

Talitha Gerlach returned to the US in 1940 via Hong Kong, where she met Madam Sun for the first time.

Talitha Gerlach campaigned to obtain money and support in the US for the China Welfare Fund, which disregarded Chiang Kai-shek's protests and sent aid to Communist-held regions of China.

Talitha Gerlach was among the supporters of the Committee for a Democratic Far Eastern Policy, as were Rose Terlin, Lily Haas and others.

Talitha Gerlach returned to China in July 1946 to resume her YWCA work, and was invited by Madame Sun to join the China Welfare Institute executive, but was recalled to the US in December 1947.

Talitha Gerlach retired in 1951 as soon as she had completed 25 years of service and was eligible for pension benefits.

Talitha Gerlach joined Yu Jiying, a former YWCA secretary, to undertake social service work at the China Welfare Institute, which Soong Ching-ling had founded during the civil war to help the poorest people in the slums of Shanghai, and after the war to give infant care, health and literacy classes.

In 1956, at a time when US politics was very right-wing, Russell wrote to Talitha Gerlach expressing envy for her greater freedom in China.

The reality was the foreigners such as Talitha Gerlach had little freedom of speech, and were subject to tight travel restrictions.

Talitha Gerlach had protectors at senior levels in the party, and unlike other foreigners was not arrested during the Cultural Revolution that Mao Zedong launched in 1966.

Talitha Gerlach was considered an "old China hand", as were Ruth Weiss and Hans Muller, all of whom were associated with Soong Ching-ling and had been known and trusted in Shanghai before the revolution.

Talitha Gerlach supported the Cultural Revolution, and wrote to her old friend Maud Russell describing the events with approval.

Talitha Gerlach told Cook she had received no support from the YWCA since the 1930s, and they had held back the money owed to her until she would return to the US.

Talitha Gerlach had a ground-floor flat with a large private garden, an exceptionally good residence for Shanghai at the time.

Talitha Gerlach was always loyal to the Chinese Communist Party, which she never criticized.

Talitha Gerlach died in Shanghai on 12 February 1995 and is buried there in Soong-Ching-ling Park.