Harlan Ober and Hooper Harris sailed from Hoboken, New Jersey for Naples and 'Akká on their teaching trip to India at the behest of 'Abdu'l-Bahá. (Tablet 12 March, 1906) Dr. William Moore, brother of Lua Getsinger, had been chosen to accompany Hooper Harris but he died unexpectedly. Harlan did not have the means for such a trip but Lua Getsinger loaned him the necessary funds. [BW13p868]
• During their three days stopover in 'Akká 'Abdu'l-Bahá provided no instructions but promised them that "Whenever difficult questions or problems come to you, turn your hearts to the heart of 'Abdu'l-Bahá and you will receive help." They found that they were astonished with some of their own answers to questions put to them during the trip. [BW13p869]
• Later 'Abdu'l-Bahá told Harlan, "Serve the people, speak in the meetings, love them in reality not through politeness, embrace them as I have embraced you. Even if you should never speak great good will be accomplished." This was to become Harlan's creed for teaching the Faith. [BW13p869]
• They traveled across India, teaching the Faith, with Persian Bahá'ís Ibn-i-Abhar and Mírzá Mahmúd. See BFA266–71 for details of the trip. [Bahaipedia]
• "Hooper Harris and Harlan Ober traveled, during no less than seven months, in India and Burma, visiting Bombay, Poona, Lahore, Calcutta, Rangoon and Mandalay." [GPB261]
• 'Abdu'l-Bahá sent the "Tablet of Purity" to America with Hooper Harris on his return from Haifa and India. [Highlights of the First 40 Years of the Bahá'í Faith in New York, City of the Covenant, 1892-1932 by Hussein Ahdieh p10]

The first Argentineans to become Bahá'ís, Hermann Grossmann and his sister Elsa Grossman, accepted the Faith in Leipzig in 1920.
• They were born in Argentina and emigrated to Germany in 1909.
• Dr Grossman heard of the Faith at a public meeting given by Harlan and Grace Ober at the Theosophical Society. [BW13:869]

GRACE ROBARTS OBER was the aunt of John Robarts. She was introduced to the Cause by Lua Getzinger and Grace, at once, recognized Baha'u'llah and became a Baha'i in 1906. Grace met Harlon Ober when she was working at Lanier Camp on River Road in Eliot, Maine. He was at Green Acre.

During the time of the visit of Àbdu'l-Bahá, Grace went with Lua to prepare a place for Àbdu'l-Bahá in Chicago and then, after subletting her cottage at Green Acre she made arrangements for His visit to New York City.

It was the wish of Àbdu'l-Bahá that she marry Harlan Ober. Lua came to her to give her this news. She had only met Harlan a few times and was unprepared to contact him so Lua wrote to Harlan - and Harlan, radiant at the thought that he was obeying a suggestion of his beloved Master, took the next train to New York from Boston where he lived. He came at once to see Grace and together they went walking through Central Park where he proposed and Grace, still. dazed.and uncertain, accepted - because it was the will of Àbdu'l-Bahá.

Grace and Harlan were married by Àbdu'l-Bahá at the home He was staying in in New York City. Later that same day they were married again by the laws of New York when Howard Colby Ives performed the legal ceremony.

In 1938 Grace went on an extensive teaching trip through the Southern states. She had been very ill previous to this. The teaching trip ended in time for her to reach Wilmette and attend the Convention in the spring of 1938.

It was a very radiant Convention and the report Grace gave of her teaching trip was one of the high points of it because Grace herself was so radiant and filled with the glory of the great privilege of teaching. She stood there, before the crowded hall in the Bahá'í House of Worship, filled with the great glory that shone from her and, closing her report, she uttered a tremendous clarion call for pioneers and for teachers. Then she walked down to resume her seat amongst the delegates but on her way she paused beside Harlan, who had just been reelected to our National Spiritual Assembly. "I want to congratulate you now" she whispered, "I may not have time later", They smiled at each other with the perfect understanding that had always existed between them. Then Grace slipped into her own seat.

As she sat down her head drooped slightly and those glancing at her assumed she was lost in prayer. But when she made no movement for many moments someone touched her and realized something was wrong. Edris Rice-Wray and Katherine True both moved forward - and Grace was gone - gone through her Open Door - gone on her beautiful journey to the arms of Àbdu'l-Bahá. [Ref: Find a Grave]

The National Convention was held in Chicago. Those elected to the National Spiritual Assembly were: Dorothy Baker, Allen McDaniel, Horace Holley, Roy Wilhelm, George Latimer, Seigfried Schopflocher, Amelia Collins, Harlan Ober, and Charles Ioas. [BN Issue 116 June 1938 p4]
• Grace Roberts Ober, who had just given a report on a travel teaching trip to Louisville KY and on her work in Toronto where she had been the previous Fall, collapsed into the arms of the Convention chairman, Harlan Ober in view of the assembled delegates while ending her address. She was removed from the convention hall and passed away shortly thereafter. See TG75-76 and FMH273-274 for the background to this story.
• Born in Thorold, ON of Sarah E. Wilson and the Rev Thomas Tempest Robarts, a cannon in the Anglican Church, Grace's life's work was that of a teacher.
• During 'Abdu'l-Baha's tour of America she served as his household manager, going ahead to secure an apartment for him and acting as His housekeeper and hostess.
• On July 17, 1912 she married Harlan Ober at 'Abdu'l-Bahá's suggestion. The legal marriage was conducted by Howard Colby Ives. [BW8p656-660]

The passing of Harlan Foster Ober (b. October 6, 1881 in Beverly, Massachusetts) in Pretoria, Gauteng, South Africa.
• He had graduated from Harvard University in 1905 with a B.A. and later obtained a law degree from Northeastern University in Boston.
• Harlan Ober became a Bahá'í at Green Acre in 1905. Another source said it was in the spring of 1906 in a room in the Commonwealth Hotel in Boston that he overcame his doubts while using a prayer and other literature given to him by Lua Getsinger. [LDNW23; 100-101; SBR120-121]
• Hooper Harris and Lua Getsinger's brother, Dr. William Moore, were selected to make a teaching trip to India. When Moore died suddenly Harlan Ober was chosen to replace him. As he had no funds for the trip Lua borrowed the money from Mr Hervey Lunt, the father of Alfred Lunt. [LGHC105]
• In 1906 he made a visit to 'Abdu'l-Bahá while He was still confined to prison.
• On the 17th of July, 1912 he married Grace Roberts (aunt of future Hand of the Cause John Robarts) in a ceremony conducted by the Reverend Howard Colby Ives at 209 West 78th Street in New York. When 'Abdu'l-Bahá visited America in 1912 He had suggested that Grace Robarts and Harlan marry, and they both agreed with the match, with Harlan travelling to New York from Boston and proposing in Central Park after being informed of the suggestion by Lua Getsinger. 'Abdu'l-Bahá performed the marriage ceremony in the room he was staying in in New York on July 17, 1912, and Howard Colby Ives later performed a legal ceremony. [SoW Vol 3 No 12 p14; Bahaipedia; The Jouney West, July 2012; Mother's Stories: Stories of 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Early Believers told by Muriel Ives Barrow Newhall to her son, p. 20]
• They adopted three children of English, German and Russian background.
• It was from their home in Cambridge, MA, from the office of the National Teaching Committee, that the first Teaching Bulletin was issued on November 19, 1919. This bulletin evolved to the US Baha'i News.
• He was closely involved with Race Unity work and made many teaching trips to the southern states with his friend Louis Gregory.
• He served on the Bahá'í Temple Unity Executive Board as president or secretary from 1918 to 1920. The work of this board was taken over by the National Spiritual Assembly when it was elected in 1922.
• In 1938 Harlan was elected to the National Spiritual Assembly of the United States and Canada and he served on it until 1941.
• Grace passed away in 1938, leaving Harlan widowed.
• He married his second wife, Dr Elizabeth Kidder Ober in Beverly, MA on the 21st of June, 1941. Shoghi Effendi was pleased with the way the marriage was conducted, without having any church ceremony or minister conduct the service. [BW13p869, 871]
• After their pilgrimage in 1956 Harlan and Elizabeth Ober travelled to South Africa where they helped form the first all-African Local Spiritual Assembly in Pretoria as had previously been request of them by the Guardian. They returned in December as pioneers. [BW13869]
• He was appointed to the Auxiliary Board for Protection in Africa in October of 1957 and served on the National Teaching Committee of South and West Africa for two years.
• He was buried in the Zandfontein Cemetery in Pretoria. [BW13p870; Find a grave; Bahaipedia; BW13p869]