Andrew Swarts (1838 - 1898)

Born 17 Dec 1838 in Sanilac, Michigan, United States

Ancestors

Died 17 Oct 1898 at age 59 in Seattle, King, Washington, United States

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Biography

Andrew was born in 1838. He was the son of Simon Swarts and Sarah Banghart. He became an Episcopal Methodist minister in March of 1867, and ministered to people in the Peru area of Nebraska. About the same time he married his first wife, Sarah Jean, with whom he had three children. The two divorced at some point before 1876.

He remarried to Kate Bishop in 1883, and Kate brought him to a meeting with Mary Baker Eddy to hear about Christian Scientists. He went on to create a similar institution called Spiritual Science University in Chicago, which he named himself president of. In this role, he wrote a book, "Mind-Healing Condensed" which was copyrighted for the Library of Congress in 1889. His philosophy married the teachings of Christian Scientists and the spiritualist movement, which was wildly controversial, but kept him busy with many speaking engagements in a variety of far flung cities in the US. He was later named in association with the Mental Scientists, and the Mental Science University, also out of Chicago. He passed away in 1898 of pneumonia while visiting his sister in Seattle, and was buried by the local Masons.

Sources

• 1850 United States Federal Census
• 1870 United States Federal Census
• Ancestry Family Trees
• Cook County, Illinois, U.S., Marriages Index, 1871-1920
• Geneanet Community Trees Index
• Illinois, U.S., Marriage Index, 1860-1920