Studies of the international missionary enterprise have largely been nation-specific and framed either as a cultural imposition (a form of imperialism/colonialism) or a gift (salvation, in the view of the Christian community). Few missionary studies recognize the multinational nature of the enterprise, or of the intense and complex power relationships experienced by individual women negotiating their place in "foreign" lands.This study focuses on the women of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (hereafter ABCFM), founded in 1810 by a group of Congregationalists, which, in 1868, created the auxiliary Women's Boards giving generations of college-educated women the auspices under which they could travel freely around the world. 1 Because the women were recruited from college campuses specifically to teach,