Pauline Hancock

Who was Pauline Hancock?

Pauline Bailey Hancock was the founder of the Church of Christ in Independence, Missouri in 1946, and was the first woman to found and lead a denomination in the Latter Day Saint movement. A former member of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and then later the Church of Christ, Hancock was excommunicated from the Temple Lot church in 1946, due to differences between her view of the Godhead and theirs. She later claimed a vision of Jesus Christ, whom she claimed had told her to "go and teach," leading her to found her own church in 1946. She would lead this church until her death in 1962.