The Religious Society of Friends was founded by George Fox in England in the 1640s. Its members later became known as the Quakers for reasons that aren't certain.
George Fox was a staunch critic of the mixing of faith and politics in the Church of England, especially as it related to war. Pacifism remains a central value for the Quakers.
By the 1660's, the Friends movement had organized and was holding meetings regularly. Worship was (and still is) characterized by silently and patiently waiting for the Holy Spirit to move and speak to them.
Today, there are approximately 400,000 Quakers worldwide; about 100,000 of those are found in the United States. Well-known people with roots in Quakerism include frontiersman Daniel Boone, actor James Dean, former U.S. presidents Herbert Hoover and Richard Nixon, musician Dave Matthews, philanthropist Johns Hopkins, seamstress of the first American flag, Betsy Ross, and American poet, Walt Whitman.