The Bahá’í community of the Champaign-Urbana area dates back to 1909 when Dr. Susan Moody was invited to come from Chicago to give a lecture on this new faith. Several people at that meeting became Bahá’ís within short time and from that beginning the local Bahá’í community grew.
Its early members included Albert Ross Vail, Mrs. George Busey and several University of Illinois professors and their wives. Mr. Vail, a Unitarian minister, played a vital role in building the Bahá’í community in Urbana. He and his wife were the first to begin having regular meetings in their home, and he started a Bahá’í youth group at the university.
By 1927 the community was hosting monthly meetings in lecture rooms at the university where a number of well-known Bahá’í speakers gave presentations. The Bahá’í teachings on race unity was of important interest to this early group, and in 1928 Louis Gregory, a lawyer and son of former slaves, assisted with a race amity conference on campus and gave eleven talks on race relations to sociology classes at the university.
In 1937,the first Univerity Bahá’í Association in America to be recognized as an official university activity was formed at the University of Illinois.
The Busey home on Elm Street in Urbana became the first permanent Bahá’í Center in the area and was the beloved location of Bahá’í gatherings for many years. Following its loss by fire in 1987, a new Center was purchased on East Green Street in the Historic East Urbana Neighborhood.
Over the years, the Bahá’ís of Urbana and Champaign have continued to serve the community through cooperative endeavors with other social and religious groups in the areas of race relations, peace advocacy, child education, and interfaith activities.