September 25. On this date in 2009, Kathryn Alio died. An early American Bahá'í who pioneered to Alaska, Lesotho and Iceland, she served on the National Spiritual Assembly of Alaska.

 

September 25. On this date in 2009, Kathryn Alio died. An early American Bahá'í who pioneered to Alaska, Lesotho and Iceland, she served on the National Spiritual Assembly of Alaska.

Kathryn Alio was born in Columbus Ohio on February 4, 1906 as the second of six children. She cared for her younger siblings as a child. At some point she moved to Dayton where she worked as a secretary at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.

She became a Bahá'í while living in Dayton by 1940 and despite being an isolated Bahá'í she remained an active member of the community, attending an inter-city Teaching Conference in Springfield in 1946. By 1949 a Local Spiritual Assembly of Dayton had been established, and Kathryn served as its Secretary.

In 1954 she left Dayton, pioneering to Fairbanks in Alaska, and moving to Anchorage shortly after arriving. She was elected to the Alaskan National Spiritual Assembly shortly after it was established and served on it until 1963. She served as editor of Alaska Bahá'í News from 1962 to 1964. In 1967 she was a member of a Proclamation Committee in Anchorage, which aimed to teach the Faith on a wide scale.

Kathryn pioneered to Lesotho in the late 1960’s and wrote a report on the first Lesotho National Convention in 1971. She moved from South Africa to Iceland, and returned to Alaska during the 1970’s where she worked at a department store in her old age.

In 2005 she moved to Waltham Crossings, where she lived with her sister Phyllis.

She died on September 25, 2009, at the age of 103.