Guide to the Eunice Blanchard Poethig Papers

Eunice Blanchard Poethig was a Presbyterian minister, writer, and executive. She was born on January 16, 1930 in Hempstead, New York and was the daughter of Werner J. Blanchard, inventor of the "aeroprop" propeller engine. After Werner's death in 1948, Eunice's mother, Juliet Stroh Blanchard, developed a career as a noted film producer, writer, and lecturer; she was active in the Ohio League of Women Voters and served as the league's observer at the United Nations.

Eunice graduated from Union Theological Seminary in 1952, married Richard P. Poethig that June, and accompanied him to his first call, Northminster Presbyterian Church (Buffalo, New York). The couple had five children: Richard Scott, Kathryn Aileen, Johanna Carol, Margaret Juliet, and Erika Christy. The Poethigs were appointed to the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. Board of Foreign Missions Philippines Mission and arrived in Manila in March 1957. Eunice had a keen interest in the role music plays in religious life and published her first works on the subject during the family’s time in the Philippines. The family left mission work in 1972 and relocated to Chicago. Eunice completed a Master of Divinity degree at McCormick Theological Seminary in 1975 and was ordained by the Presbytery of Chicago in 1979. She served as associate executive of the Presbytery of Chicago from 1979 to 1985; as executive presbyter of the Presbytery of Western New York from 1986 to 1993; and as director of the PC(USA) General Assembly Council Congregational Ministries Division (CMD) from 1993 to 1998. She was forced to leave her directorship of the CMD when the CMD Committee did not renew her contract in 1997. She completed a Ph.D. at Union Theological Seminary in 1985; her dissertation was on what she called the “victory song tradition” of early Israelite women.

Eunice's ministry revolved around economic justice and equality for women and sexual and gender minorities. She served in the early 1990s on the governing board of More Light Presbyterians, was involved in the 1993 Re-Imagining Conference, joined the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, and organized two conferences in the Presbytery of Chicago celebrating the ordination of women in 1995 and 1996. After her forced departure from CMD, she began service on the board of the Stony Point Center in 2003, and she wrote prolifically. Among her writings, Eunice contributed numerous articles and Bible studies to "Horizons" magazine and authored a 1998 Stony Point seminar, "Weaving Theology and Music With the Events of our Times." In 2011 Eunice was elected president of the International Association of Women Ministers. She died on March 25, 2018.