Regular contact with the Persian Baha'i community prompted North American Baha'is to assist them. Sidney Sprague initiated the first effort. The Baha'is in Tehran had established the Tarbiyat School in about 1897. Soon after arriving in Tehran in 1908 Sprague was appointed its principal and after a year of living in Tehran he had become familiar with the economic and educational conditions of the Iranian Baha'i community. In the summer of 1909 he visited the United States to give a series of talks to the Baha'is regarding the needs of their Persian brethren. While in Chicago he spoke to Ahmad Sohrab, who was visiting the city on business. Sohrab became quite excited about the possibility of establishing an association dedicated to the educational, economic and commercial development of Iran and its Baha'i community. Sohrab returned to Washington DC where he was living and spoke to prominent Baha'is there about the idea.
Washington was the ideal headquarters for such an association. Sohrab was young, intelligent, articulate and fluent in the English language. Charles Mason Remey was an excellent organizer and possessed considerable financial means. Joseph Hannen was a capable leader. Louis Gregory was a lawyer who could manage the association's legal affairs and was extremely concerned about questions of educational and economic advancement. Furthermore, Washington was a city filled with embassies and organizations created to foster commercial, educational and cultural ties between countries.
During the autumn Sohrab wrote letters about the proposed society to prominent Baha'is throughout the United States and received several positive responses. On Saturday, 30 October 1909 he invited the Washington Baha'is to his apartment to discuss the idea. Twenty-two came and a committee consisting of Sohrab, Fred Woodward and Joseph Hannen was appointed to draw up a constitution and a prospectus. A letter was sent to 'Abdu'lBaha as well, requesting His approval of the project.
The planning committee decided that the society would not be an official Baha'i association but would be open to all and designed to serve all Iranians. The society would not have as its purpose the teaching of the Baha'i Faith in Persia, partly because it needed the cooperation of the Persian government to succeed. Rather, its goals were to assist Iran in educational and economic development with any benefits to the Baha'i Faith - such as increased recognition and prestige - being secondary concerns only. Once the committee had defined the structure and purpose of the Persian-American Educational Society, it planned a proper inauguration. Three hundred and fifty people, Baha'is and non-Baha'is, including many members of high society, attended the introductory meeting on Saturday evening, 8 January 1910. The newly-appointed American minister to Iran, Charles Russell, had not yet left Washington and thus was able to attend the ceremony. Iran's representative to the United States also came. The event was a great success, as Sohrab noted:
“It was one of those singular, awe-inspiring meetings ... Lectures were delivered, music played and sung, Constitution was read and officers were elected. All the people were most enthusiastic and repeated cheers and plaudits rung through the great, spacious studio ... The meeting was a complete success, beyond our expectations or dream, no antagonism, no difference, the whole mass of people responded and worked together like a perfect clock! Happiness in the face, unity of purpose and ideal, confidence and trust were the overwhelming note of the meeting. When the last number of the solo [was] played by Miss McNeal ... for two minutes clapping of hands continued for the long and happy success of the Society and its ideals. It was half past eleven when people left the studio.”
Four Washington newspapers printed articles about the meeting. The gathering unanimously approved the committee's recommendations for officers. Like most American philanthropic associations, the Persian-American Educational Society had many honorary vice presidents. Two were Washington Baha'is - Charles Mason Remey and Alice Pike Barney - and one was a Chicago Baha'i, Harry Clayton Thompson. William Hoar was its president, Joseph Hannen its corresponding secretary and Ahmad Sohrab its treasurer. Although not advertised as a specifically Baha'I association, most of its officers were Baha'is. In addition, virtually all of the Society's financial support came from American Baha'is.
In April 'Abdu'l-Baha sent a Tablet to the Persian-American Educational Society and praised it highly:
“You should change the name of this society to the 'Persian-American Unity Society' so that, in the future, the society may concern itself in all areas - commercial, industrial, cultural - and be productive of benefits that are at once moral and material. Now, although the society may appear at this early stage to be quite insignificant, it will be seen in the future of what moment it was that - praise be to God! - the friends should have had their thoughts focussed from the first on this important undertaking. Should the scope of this society be enlarged, should it be soundly organized and competently managed, should its foundations be firmly and securely laid, and its members steadfast and constant - then ye may be assured that it will ultimately come to rank among the world's foremost such associations, and the benefits and achievements that will accrue from it will be inestimable. It will become a symbol of the oneness of the human world, a tree that casteth its shade over East and West; but constancy is the condition of success - constancy and steadfast perseverance ...
Yours will be the first society to be established bearing this designation. 'Abdu'l-Baha, in utter lowliness and entire devotion before the Abha Kingdom, is praying on your behalf, and beseeching that ye be granted confirmation and assistance. How blessed will be this Persian-American Unity Society if it be placed upon correct and proper foundations (for if it is not, it will remain fruitless and unproductive). Blessed is this society! Blessed is this society!
Be sure to send to the Holy Land each month a report of the proceedings of this society.”
From this Tablet it can be seen that 'Abdu'l-Baha was unusually enthusiastic about the project and strongly endorsed the effort to assist in Iran's development. But He was also cautious, for should such a project fail or be carried out incompetently, considerable damage could be caused to the reputation of the Baha'i Faith; hence the request for monthly reports.
The Persian-American Educational Society made assistance of the Tarbiyat School its first priority. Two types of memberships in the society were established: an associate membership that paid for the monthly bulletins and an active membership that paid for the scholarship of a Persian child at Tarbiyat as well. The latter cost $18 a year and the patron would receive a photograph of the child and a report of his or her progress.
The Society held its first annual meeting in Washington on 16 and 17 June 1910. Among the speakers at the session were Ali Kuli Khan, Charge d' Affairs of Persia in the United States; Hon. Elmer Ellsworth Brown, United States Commissioner of Education; Dr Benjamin F. Trueblood, Secretary of the American Peace Society; Hon. C.S. Donaldson, Chief of the Consular Division of the Bureau of Manufactures; and Professor Hermann Schoenfield of George Washington University. Several Baha'is spoke, including Howard MacNutt, Hooper Harris, William Hoar, Ahmad Sohrab and Edward Getsinger. The highlight of the conference was a talk by, and later a reception for, Ghodsea Khanum Ashraf, the first Persian woman to travel to the United States. Her visit produced considerable newspaper coverage.
Expansion of the activities of the society was discussed and it was decided to merge its activities with the Orient-Occident Unity Society, should the latter be established. Among the proposals made at the conference were the establishment of additional schools in Iran; the sending of American doctors, nurses, engineers and dentists to the Orient; the expansion of the Tarbiyat school's library and the creation of an English reading room in Tehran; the formation of a Teacher's Association in Iran; the assembling of data on schools and on the number of pupils in Iran; the opening of an Exposition of American agricultural, mining, textile and railway machinery in Iran; and the assistance of the Sehat Hospital in Tehran. (The Baha’i Faith in America, vol. 2, by Robert Stockman, pp. 354-358; A Basic Baha’i Chronology, by Glenn Cameron)