Fred Hawley and George Allison

      In 1904, Unity Church's luck began to change.  Although the members were still meeting in Martine's Hall, they finally were able to call a minister to the pulpit.  

     Rev. Fred V. Hawley had been ordained a Baptist minister in 1891, but withdrew from that denomination two years later.  He founded People's Church in Brooklyn, Michigan and later served as pastor in other Unitarian churches.  His last post before Unity was as Secretary of the Western Unitarian Conference.  

     During Rev. Hawley's first year at Unity, things started looking much better.  As attendance grew, the leadership began making plans to build a new church.  They chose the corner of Barry and Orchard for that location.  They bought the lot for the magnificent sum of $8,000 and erected the building for less than $24,000.  Services began there in 1906.  

Among the changes Rev. Hawley made were to replace pew rentals with free pews and pledges from the members.  This meant that membership could then be open to people who couldn't afford to pay for a pew.  He also instituted the practice of ingathering ceremonies, which continue to this day.       Rev. Hawley seemed to make quite an impression on those around him and one was quoted as saying he was, "a minister of the greatest friendliness and sweetness of nature, and certain heart moving eloquence in both prayers and sermons.:  One member, however, wrote that if he were a bit more sensational, he might raise the public more.  

     This didn't mean that he was just a stay-at-church minister.  There are a number of newspaper articles which list his name as a speaker during civic and religious functions.  He was one of the speakers at a luncheon in honor of Clara Barton (a Universalist) given by the Social Economics Club in 1910.  Rev. Hawley was also a speaker, along with prominent Chicago clergymen, at Wellington Avenue church in 1924, and was a speaker at the Walt Whitman dinner in 1927.   Unfortunately, time passed and the members of the congregation grew older, died or moved to the suburbs.  Although some of the members who had passed away had left the church some very nice legacies, there were very few people left in the pews.  

     In 1923, faced with a dwindling membership, a resolution was passed at the annual meeting authorizing the trustees to sell the building and move farther north.  The Board Chair, W. M. Welch, offered the property to the Masons, but this time they decided not to buy.  Since by that times there was a Unitarian church in Evanston, the move couldn't be too much in a northerly direction.  The members of the church finally decided to stay put.  

    Rev. Hawley, however, had a plan of his own.  A theater building around Wilson of Lawrence housed the North Shore Universalist church each Sunday morning.  Its minister, the Rev. George W. Allison, had been a salesman and was known for lively sermons.  In early November of 1927, the two ministers met to discuss merging their churches.  The idea probably was that when Hawley retired (he was already 65 years old), Allison would take over as minister of the combined congregations.  Both ministers agreed to recommend the plan to their churches and Hawley was going to bring it up during the December annual meeting.  

     Sadly, on November 15th of that year, Rev. Hawley was hit by a truck and killed as he was leaving the Montrose Ave. street car at Clark.  The Secretary of the Western Unitarian Conference, Curtis Reese, stepped in to help Unity.  He preached at the church and persuaded the congregation to hire George Allison as its minister.  

      Although the church grew, since Rev. Allison brought his Universalist members along with him, some of the Unity members felt they had been pressured.  Allison proved to be a very good organizer, a fine speaker and was active in strengthening ties to the community.  All of this lasted for two years.  To make ends meet, he found it necessary to take a job during the week in St. Louis, where he was the promoter-in charge of vacuum cleaner salesmen.  He would then drive back to Chicago on Saturday to preach his Sunday sermon.  This did not sit well with the trustees and he was asked to choose between Unity and his job in St. Louis.  Considering that he was making more money at his other position, St. Louis won and he resigned in 1929.