A Visionary Founder: The Life and Legacy of Ann Lee Ann Lee, known to her followers as Mother Ann, remains a compelling figure in American religious history—a woman who forged a uniquely communal faith from the fringes of 18th-century England and transplanted it to the nascent United States. Born Ann Lees in Manchester on February 29, 1736, her early life was marked by hardship and spiritual seeking. The daughter of a blacksmith, she experienced poverty and loss, working in textile mills as a young woman and enduring the deaths of four infant children after marrying Abraham Standerin in 1762…