Lowell Fillmore: A Lifetime of Growing Unity

Lowell Fillmore is the unsung hero of the Unity movement. While known for his humility, Lowell quietly drove exponential growth for Unity around the world.

The eldest son of Unity founders Charles and Myrtle Fillmore, Lowell “probably did more to popularize the Unity teaching in the twentieth century than either of his parents,” Neal Vahle wrote in his definitive history, The Unity Movement.

Born January 4, 1882, in Pueblo, Colorado, Lowell was named for James Russell Lowell, a poet and editor of The Atlantic Monthly, at the time a leading literary and cultural magazine that published commentary from the best writers of the day. Lowell Fillmore, too, became a prolific writer whose clear exposition of metaphysical teachings inspired hundreds of thousands of people who were new to Unity ideas.

A Lifelong Career

Lowell spent his entire working life at Unity, starting by wrapping magazines at age 10, then helping his mother edit her prized magazine for children, Wee Wisdom^®. He sometimes served as a one-person focus group for Myrtle when she needed to know how boys thought or what would resonate with elementary-age children.

He also taught Sunday school at the family church, Unity Society of Practical Christianity, and as a teenager began to edit the church newsletter, Weekly Unity. It was soon offered to the public and eventually drew an international audience to Unity teachings. Lowell remained the editor for 63 years until it was discontinued in 1972, writing a column almost every week called “Things to Be Remembered.”

After he graduated from high school in Kansas City in 1899, the end of his formal education, Lowell performed manual jobs at Unity until he took over as business manager in 1907. “My father insisted: You can do it and if something comes up, I will help you,” he said.

At 32, Lowell became general manager, tasked with running the education programs and expanding the publishing department.

When cofounder Charles Fillmore pulled back from daily operations in 1933, Lowell took the reins at Unity, then became president upon his father’s death in 1948. He retired in 1964 but remained active in Unity until his death in 1975.

Lowell’s niece Rosemary Fillmore Rhea said, “He was the sweetest, dearest man that you could ever meet in your life. He was just too good to be true … He was like his mother. He was totally dedicated to Unity work.”

A Benevolent Boss

Author Marcus Bach, a religion professor at Iowa State University and an authority on world religions, described Lowell at 60 as handsome, healthy, and white-haired. “His manner is consistently calm and simple, and he gives the impression that he is nothing more than a Unity worker, which, of course, he is.”

Lowell always wanted to be near the workers. His office was just off the main lobby at 917 Tracy Street in downtown Kansas City, the original home of Unity. When operations moved 15 miles to Unity Village, where Lowell oversaw 800 employees, he ensconced himself in the corner of a large room near the main entrance, flanked by bookshelves and filing cabinets. He ate lunch every day in the Unity cafeteria and would sit with whomever had an open space, then clear his own dishes and work the room, saying hello to any workers who happened to be there. He never missed having coffee with groups who were on campus for retreats. Everyone called him Lowell.

Lowell was relentlessly positive and would not brook negative talk, said Retta Chilcott, who worked with him for 40 years as administrative assistant and personnel manager. He was supportive of employees—he often held them in prayer—but he “never agrees with negation,” she said.

Barney Ricketts, who worked directly for Lowell for 35 years as treasurer and head of accounting, said, “If you want to get Lowell to do something, you don’t tell him how much it will cost or how much money it will bring; you tell him how much good it is going to do … I have never seen Lowell make a decision on any other basis than that of service. How many people will it bless?”

Lowell’s nephew, Charles R. Fillmore, who replaced him as president of Unity in 1964, said, “The older I get, the more appreciation I have for my Uncle Lowell … In many ways he lived exactly what he believed.”

A Reversal on Race

In hindsight, Lowell might wish he could revisit some of his decisions. During part of his tenure as a Unity executive, Black students were not allowed to stay overnight at Unity Village and had to eat separately. In 1953, Lowell appeared in blackface as part of a Christmas minstrel show for the employees.

The Call, a Kansas City newspaper for the Black community, interviewed Lowell about Unity policies in 1934 after Black delegates were refused lodging at a National Conference of Social Work on the Unity grounds. Lowell fumbled his answer. “You do not quite understand. We are feeling our way along. This is Missouri, and the Missouri people are not educated to the point, as yet, where they will accept Negroes on a basis of equality.”

Lowell was heading Unity 20 years later when Unity reversed its policy and allowed a Black ministerial student, Johnnie Colemon, to live on campus. Unity still strives to meet the ideals of cofounder Charles Fillmore, who said in 1927: “We see no separation in color, in race, in sect, in creed, in anything. We are all one Spirit.”

Offering Unity in Spanish

Lowell was the first to suggest that Unity should begin translating some of its many publications into Spanish. He established a Unity Spanish Department in 1921, starting the translations with writer H. Emilie Cady’s pamphlet, Finding the Christ in Ourselves, which had been the first article she published in the early days of Unity. The divine nature of human beings was perhaps Lowell’s favorite theological topic.

For a few years Unity published a Spanish-language magazine called El Sembrador (The Sower) that pulled together various Unity articles and translated them. Then in 1955, the flagship Daily Word^® magazine began to be translated as La Palabra Diaria and is still in circulation today. The first Spanish-speaking ministers were also ordained in the 1950s.

The Spark for Unity Growth

Lowell had another idea that bore fruit beyond his wildest dreams. He was just 28 but, as always, his primary motive was to help people. He had become concerned about customers who let Unity know they could not turn loose of a whole dollar to subscribe to one of his parents’ magazines.

One day in 1910, Lowell took this question into meditation—he never made a decision without first meditating—and emerged with a divine idea: prosperity banks. The little cardboard banks fueled unprecedented growth for Unity over the next 60 years and helped elevate the abundance consciousness of thousands of people.

Prosperity banks were mailed free to anyone who requested one so they could save dimes. One dime a week for 10 weeks would equal the $1 needed for a subscription. At one point Unity was mailing out 620 banks a day. Subscriptions to Weekly Unity and Unity Magazine^® soared into the hundreds of thousands.

The banks were also a clever teaching tool for Lowell. Savers were encouraged to repeat a prosperity affirmation printed on the bank every time they dropped in a dime, then to use the affirmation if ever they had a thought of lack.

Bank users began to report evidence of abundance in all areas of their lives, with increased financial well-being and a deeper connection spiritually.

“I am well pleased with the investment,” wrote one. “Harmony has been established out of financial chaos. I realize as never before that God is the source of all good. The bank certainly brings rich returns.”

Lowell not only engineered a way for people to receive Unity teachings in the magazines, but he enhanced their understanding of prosperity principles by walking them through the bank drill.

The Teachings of Lowell Fillmore

In addition to running Unity as an organization and school, Lowell became one of its legendary writers—in the same era as James Dillet Freeman, Martha Smock, and Sig Paulson. He communicated through literally thousands of “Things to Be Remembered” columns in Weekly Unity, along with articles and columns in Unity Magazine. (You may read a sampling of them in the Lowell Fillmore section of this website.)

Philosophically, Lowell was more aligned with author H. Emilie Cady (Lessons in Truth, 1903) than with his parents. He rarely mentioned the 12 powers, humanity’s inborn divine qualities that so fascinated his father. Lowell’s focus was on the spiritual nature of all human beings and our challenge to live into Christ consciousness.

Lowell held no illusions about humanity’s slow progress, despite our being born with God-like potential as demonstrated by Jesus. In words that resonate today, Lowell wrote in 1941, “The human race is still in its infancy. Judging by the newspaper headlines, we have not ceased to be barbarians. We continue to love war and strife more than peace and harmony.”

The problem, he believed, was that we do not understand the power of our minds to unify spirit, soul, and body. “It is the negative thought habits of the human race that are keeping the affairs of the world in turmoil …” he wrote during World War II. “Thoughts of hate, fear, grief, revenge, and other human emotions are breaking up the world today in whirlwinds of destruction.”

But most of the time, his columns were sunny and encouraging. “God is within you, because your intelligence and your life and your power are within you. They are not outside you. You recognize God within yourself, and the better you understand Him, the better you will understand the fullness of life.”

He reassured readers that God is both principle and personal, and he often suggested that God needs us. “Man is one of God’s means of expressing Himself.” We came to earth to help bring God’s spiritual vision into manifestation.

God is only love, he wrote—never judgmental or vengeful, which are human emotions. He saw divine principles as God’s will for us, with our only job to understand them. “Encourage faith, fearlessness, love, goodwill, and joy. Open wide the gate to them; let them come in day or night. They will bring you health and prosperity.”

Lowell promoted affirmations as a way to discipline our thoughts, which hold the power to create our lives. One of his favorite affirmations: There is but one presence and one power in my life, God omnipotent. Affirmations do not change God, he explained, but renew our thinking to make it constructive.

“Your thoughts are like a great nation of people dwelling within you,” Lowell wrote. “These thought people must have supervision and guidance. If they are not directed and trained, they will run helter-skelter into confusion and discord, wasting your energy and substance. But when they are trained and kept in order, they are capable of quickly overcoming the difficulties that confront you in the world. If you would have a happy, healthy, harmonious life, you must rein in your thoughts.”

In nearly every column, Lowell presented Jesus as our exemplar, the only person ever to realize divine consciousness. Jesus showed us how to use eternal laws and taught that anyone can create the kingdom of God.

Honored and Remembered

In today’s Unity, Lowell’s many achievements and his writings are still overshadowed by his parents’. But what many consider the heyday of the Unity movement occurred under Lowell’s leadership in the mid-20th century. Growth was explosive, and the Unity publications and prayer ministry established themselves as indispensable spiritual tools for millions of people.

Lowell presided over the 1951 dedication of what’s known as the iconic Bridge of Faith, officially named the Charles and Myrtle Fillmore Bridge to honor his parents. It spans the enormous fountain display in the Unity Village courtyard.

Unity Village, where Lowell and his wife Alice took up residence in 1928, honored him with Lowell’s Garden Terrace two years after he died in 1974—a small, lush space used for weddings and other ceremonies. On quiet weekdays it serves as a private retreat for anyone seeking solace or inspiration, and it is the perfect setting to appreciate the natural beauty of Unity Village as Lowell did.