One was once a station on the Underground Railroad, providing a temporary haven to enslaved people who had escaped bondage. Another was the birthplace of Morris Brown College, the first higher education institution in Georgia to be owned completely by African Americans. Yet another was the HQ of the Louisiana Native Guards—Black soldiers who fought for the Union—and then later a meeting place for Civil Rights marchers.
Town Clock Church in New Albany, Indiana, Big Bethel AME Church of Atlanta, and St. James AME Church of New Orleans are three of the 31 Black churches awarded a total of $4 million from the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The grants, coming from the trust’s African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, were announced on January 15, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.
The churches, some of which had been shut down for decades due to safety issues—such as South Carolina’s wood-framed Taveau Church, built in 1835—will give congregations the wherewithal to address such matters as structural integrity, mold, demolition, water filtration and other issues.
“We created the Preserving Black Churches program to ensure the historic Black church’s legacy is told and secured,” said Brent Leggs, executive director of the fund, in a statement. “These cultural assets can continue to foster community resilience and drive meaningful change in our society.”
First Missionary Baptist Church was constructed in Thomasville, Georgia by formerly enslaved congregants between 1890 and 1900—and has been visited by generations of leading lights in the African American firmament, including Shirley Chisolm and Jesse Jackson.
Jacob’s Chapel AME Churchand the Colemantown Meeting House in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, are the last remnants of what once was the African American community of Colemantown, established in 1828. It was another stop on the Underground Railroad and served as both a house of worship and a school.
In 1866, just seven months after Juneteenth when the enslaved people of Texas were emancipated, nine men and women founded Antioch Missionary Baptist Church, the oldest Black Baptist Church in Houston.
The six churches mentioned above and over two dozen others will now be able to either keep their doors open or open them for the first time in years. Along with the current grants and the grants provided last year, the Action Fund has now supported more than 70 historic Black churches with $8.7 million in grants.
Historian Henry Louis Gates Jr., an adviser to the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund which is supported by Lilly Endowment Inc., welcomed the decisions on the new grant recipients.
“The heart of our spiritual world is the Black church,” said Gates in the announcement. “These places of worship, these sacred cultural centers, must exist for future generations to understand who we were as a people.”
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