United Prebyterian Women (UPW) and Women of the Church (WOC) share a common history from the time of the establishment of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America in 1789 to the beginning of the Civil War in 1861.
Their stories begin with women in local congregations who responded with good deeds to the needs of society. These were grassroots efforts by women to testify to their religious beliefs, expressed by doing for those less fortunate.
The Women’s General Missionary Society of the United Presbyterian Church of North America, formed in 1883, is the earliest predecessor or organized women’s work. Over time the women’s organizations evolved and merged. As recently as 1988, UPW and WOC jointly established a new design to become Presbyterian Women in the Presbyterian Church USA, known today as PW.