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MENNONITE HANDBOOK

bered as "Twelfth Month," and was the last of the year.

Before and up to this time all paper used in America for printing books and newspapers had been manufactured in Europe.

The significant item in the history of the American colonies appeared in the fact that the first paper mill operated in the New World was erected in the year 1690 at Germantown, Pennsylvania, by Wilhelm Rittenhuysen, a member and first minister in the Mennonite Church in America.

Later Organizations

Toward the latter part of the nineteenth century a very pronounced sentiment developed among the Mennonite people in favor of establishing church schools for the benefit of such young people as desired a higher education. In 1895 the Elkhart Institute Association was formed at Elkhart, Indiana, and a suitable building was erected known as Elkhart Institute. This organization continued in existence for ten years, when it disbanded voluntarily and the property passed into the hands of the Mennonite Board of Education. In the meantime the Elkhart Institute was sold and a new institution built up at Goshen, Indiana, which has since been known as Goshen College.

The Mennonite Board of Education is composed of representatives from each of the Mennonite district conferences, three appointed by Mennonite General Conference, and several members at large elected by the Board itself. It meets annually, at some centrally located place. At the present time two