and was deputized by the United States National Spiritual Assembly with some help from the National Spiritual Assembly of Central America. In July 1954 she left Hawaii, finally, for Japan, and then sailed from Kobe to the Marshall Islands, arriving in Majuro, capital and largest city of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, on August 7. While there she was invited to a reception in honor of a visiting U.S. congressman from Colorado where she recited, upon request, some of her "poetry of Majuro," after which the congressman asked for copies. Marcia wrote to Virginia Breaks in the Caroline Islands that most of her good friends in the Marshalls were Catholic or Jesuit priests, remarking, "this is probably natural, since I lived in a Latin-American Catholic environment for so many years." Breaks said that Atwater seemed to "greatly enjoy" her time on the islands, and "she was apparently given government housing." Marcia hoped to stay on in the islands although she was very ill during her last two months there, but she was not given another permit. She was able to stay until March 1955. During that time she taught the religion, traveled to various atolls, fulfilled some press commitments which were subject to the District Commissioner's censor but which had, in the end, been helpful in securing her visa; and she tried to get some Baháʼí information translated into Marshallese. The nature of her illness is unknown, as is the story of all her activities there, since the report she wrote was lost and she evidently never had the strength to re-write it. After leaving the islands she suffered from a debilitating skin ailment, of which she wrote, "A terrible affliction has me almost ready to be locked up: I am quite horrible to behold...." She felt her skin problem was caused by radiation burns from atomic testing on the Marshalls, but this could never be proved, and she tried unsuccessfully to collect compensation from the U.S. government. The Marshall Islands, vacated for several months when it became necessary for Atwater to leave, was replaced by another Baháʼí pioneer, Betty Klaas, from Honolulu by August 1956. By 1960 there were no pioneer Baháʼís but by 1964 there is mention of a group of Baháʼís there. The first Local Spiritual Assembly of the Baháʼís of Majuro was elected 21 April 1967. This is also the first Local Spiritual Assembly to