Joel Bean

Who was Joel Bean?

Joel Bean was a Quaker minister whose name has been associated with a branch of Quakerism that some label “Beanite.”

Bean was born in Alton, New Hampshire. His parents were John and Elizabeth Bean. He attended Friends Boarding School in Providence, Rhode Island. He moved to Iowa in 1853, where he taught school in West Branch.

Bean met Hannah Elliot Shipley from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, during a trip she took to Iowa. In 1859 they got married at the Orange Street Meeting House in Philadelphia and settled back in West Branch. They visited the Sandwich Islands from 1861-1862 as Quaker ministers. Joel was appointed clerk of the Iowa Yearly Meeting in 1867, and the couple went on a ministry tour of Europe from 1872-1873.

When they returned from the trip to Europe the Beans discovered that the revival that had been springing up among Friends in Iowa had progressed to a point that they could not approve. The revivalists insisted that people need to be “saved” and “sanctified,” which the Beans and others did not think was in accord with traditional Friends beliefs. The revivalists were also bringing into their meetings such things as programmed worship, more emotional worship, and paid pastors.