USA > Nebraska > A history of Nebraska Methodism, first half-century, 1854-1904 > Part 14
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35
While, as said before, Lucius H. Rogers was less ag- gressive, he was permitted to give nearly half a century to the Church he loved, filling faithfully the many posts of duty to which the Church called him. He was on the Commission that founded Nebraska Wesleyan, and was for many years an honored member of the Board of Trus-
I4
206
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
tees. His pastor, Rev. F. H. Sanderson, D. D., speaks thus tenderly of this departed saint :
"Lucius Henry Rogers was born in Fayetteville, New York, March 20, 1834, and died in Fremont, Nebraska. September II, 1903. He was the son of the late Rev. Lucius Cary Rogers, who labored a lifetime in the Oneida Conference. Brother Rogers imbibed the truths of re- ligion at his mother's knee, from his father's lips, in the modest parsonage of the long ago. He was cradled in the lap of piety. In the dawn of manhood he received the truth, and the emancipating power of that knowledge made him free. Himself and his brother, the late Eliphaz H. Rogers, and three more devout Methodists, organized the first Methodist Episcopal Church of Fremont, Ne- braska, forty-six years ago. As a charter member of this noble Church, and an official of the same for forty years, he demonstrated his faith in God and love to the Church. By a well ordered and consistent life and conversation, and by his large and constant contributions to its welfare, he ever said : 'I love Thy Church, O God!' In 1888 he was elected a delegate to the General Conference in New York. His spiritual experience was a living reality. His faith in God and his blessed experience of the power of Christ to save and keep, preserved him from all skeptical doubts touching the authority and inspiration of the Bible and the immortality of the soul. His spare moments were not given to folly or to the acquiring of political renown, or even to the achievement of commercial fame. Unos- tentatious, modest, always 'esteeming others better than himself,' his leisure was devoted to substantial reading and the sublime work of doing good. The Church, the poor, the great ameliorating agencies of our times, were
207
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
all objects of his ceaseless regard. His personal assist- ance, his prayers and sympathies, his purse, were ever at the command of religion, philanthropy, and charity. All the older bishops and many of the senior ministers knew and loved him. His hospitable home was always open to the Methodist itinerant. He was universally beloved and esteemed. Until ill-health prevented, he was ever at liis post in the house of God. 'He was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.'"
The two Rogers families were soon joined by another family, the Van Anda's, mother, father, and two sons, Joel A. and John A. Joel A. Van Anda was pastor of the Church at Fremont when the first church was built and Fremont Methodism took a fresh start in its steady march towards its present strength and influence. The year the church was completed, in 1870, the Conference held the first of a long series of sessions in Fremont, at every one of which the hospitality has been most cordial.
Joel A. remained as pastor the full term, but did not stay long in Nebraska, being summoned to the pastorate of some of the most important Churches in other States. His whole career has been eminently successful.
Father and Mother Van Anda remained many years as bright and shining lights, and John A. Van Anda re- mained in active business in Fremont and in faithful serv- ice in official relations to the Church until last summer, when after long and intense suffering from rheumatism, he passed to the heavenly country. His devoted wife still tarries among the working forces of the Church. Fre- mont Methodism owes much to the Van Anda family.
We find many new charges are formed, yet mostly within the area already partially occupied. In the Omaha
208
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
District we find Wood River and De Witt Charges in 1866; Fremont in 1867; City Mission, West Point, and North Platte in 1868, and Schuyler in 1869. In some cases, like Fremont, these had been parts of circuits, but had become heads of circuits or stations.
In Nebraska City District we have Blue River and Helena in 1866, and Lancaster in 1867; Cub Creek, Upper Nemaha, and Lincoln in 1868; and London, Salem, and Blue Springs in 1869.
Then we have the new Lincoln District, with the new circuits, Ashland, Oak Creek, and Northwest Blue, in 1869.
Some of these new charges that have their birth dur- ing these five years, will become important centers in due time. Among these destined to realize this larger future are Fremont, Schuyler, Wood River, which should have been named Grand Island; Blue Springs, Ashland, and last, but not least, Lincoln. Methodism in this place, the capital of the State, will, under the leadership of H. T. Davis, its first pastor, and his successors, soon forge to the front and ever after maintain its place in the lead. There was one of these new charges, West Point, that has defied the best efforts of faithful men, and has be- come defunct.
In 1865 the Minutes report six churches and six parsonages, while in 1869 we have thirteen churches and twelve parsonages. The membership has also nearly doubled, being 2,973, including probationers, in 1869, as compared with 1,564 in 1865.
It would be most interesting and profitable to trace the history of each of these stations and circuits, and to watch the work of the pastors who achieved these
209
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
splendid results, but this has become impossible for want of space. We only know that such results could only come of the work of consecrated men blessed of God in the salvation of souls, and the building up of the Church along all lines. As we view these splendid achievements, we must say, with the Master, "Well done," and hasten on to survey the labors and struggles and triumphs of the period from 1870 to 1880.
CHAPTER XII.
THIRD PERIOD. (1870-1880.)
THIS period is one of thrilling interest. It is charac- terized by a great influx of people into the State and great revivals in the Church. While up to 1870 the population had grown to 122,993, in the next five years it increased to 247,280, more people coming into the State in five years than had come the preceding fifteen years. By 1880 there were 452,542, a total increase during the decade of 323,549, while the increase during the preceding decade had been less than 95,000.
The frontier had, up to this time, extended but little, if any, over one hundred miles west of the Missouri River, except up along the line of the Union Pacific Railroad, and there but few except railroad employees had settled. But now this tide of immigration rapidly extended over the table-lands of Butler, Seward, Polk, York, Fillmore, Saline, Gage, and Jefferson Counties, pushing out up the Republican River in the south part of the State, up the Platte and Loup in the central part, and up the Elkhor !! in the north.
If I were to seek for a single word to express the sit- uation during this period, especially the first four years, that word would be expansion. This expansion was two- fold. The growth of the older charges through accre- tions, conversions, revivals, and more thorough organiza- tion. Then the territorial expansion towards the west line of the State corresponding with the extension of the set-
210
21I
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
tlements through the vast immigration of that period. Then the growth of the population within the area al- ready partially settled, and the corresponding growth of the Church, by the multiplication of appointments on the circuits and resultant increase in number of stations, cir- cuits and districts. In 1863, D. S. Davis is appointed to Wahoo Circuit. He starts in with five appointments and closes up with fourteen, and out of that one circuit there has grown four stations and circuits.
Often where there was no circuit in the beginning of the year, some presiding elder would send a man to make one, or possibly, as often happened, some zealous local preacher, or superannuated veteran, would launch out and make one. Nor were these new circuits wholly the result of the coming of Methodist settlers who only needed to be hunted up. Many of the preachers possessing the missionary spirit, would go into neighborhoods where there were perhaps no members, or not enough to organ- ize a class, hold revival-meetings, get a number converted, and thus extend the work. Then the head of a circuit would grow to the extent of being able to support a preacher, and there would be a station made of one, and a circuit made of the rest.
Rapid as was the growth of population and the exten- sion of the area of settled country, the Church kept pace with the rapid advance, and few, if any, Methodists had time to backslide before the helpful itinerant visited in their homes, bringing their Gospel and the means of grace. In many cases the growth of the Church was in excess of the population, great revivals bringing many into the kingdon1.
L. W. Smith tells of some camp-meetings and reviv-
212
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
als in the southeastern part of the Territory: "In 1862, Brother Munhall and myself had a large circuit, Falls City, Rulo, Salem, and four other points, country school- houses, of which I have forgotten the names. In 1861 we had one of the most successful camp-meetings ever held in that part of the country not far from Falls City. Brother King was on the charge at that time. I went down from Table Rock to assist him. A week had passed with no special. results. The preachers had all left ex- cept Brother King and myself. On Tuesday night I preached with unusual liberty and at the close of the ser- mon I invited them to stand up and sing. But we did not get to sing, as the people, when they stood up, began to fall all over the camp-ground, till about fifty were down and we had to take care of them. The meeting continued then about eight days longer.
"We sent out and obtained more ministerial help and the result was glorious, very many conversions. So in 1862 we continued the revival influence and gathered much from the past and had many conversions at differ- ent points that year. In 1861 L held a glorious camp- meeting on Table Rock Circuit, on the South Fork of Nemaha, at which there were many conversions."
At the beginning of this period, A. L. Folden and J. H. Presson were on the Tecumseh Circuit, and report 300 conversions, and in 1871 this same A. L. Folden is blessed with a great revival at Mt. Pleasant, with eighty- five accessions, and at Eight Mile Grove with sixty-five. The following year, on the same charge, with John Gal- lagher as junior preacher, there were one hundred con- versions at Weeping Water. To A. L. Folden's work on this charge, his presiding elder pays this tribute: "Mt.
-
213
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM. -
Pleasant Circuit embraces the central part of Cass County. This is one of the oldest, wealthiest, and most Method- istic circuits in the country. Having a live man as pastor. live men as leaders and stewards, live women at the head of the Sabbath-school, and a live membership, Mt. Pleas- ant is emphatically a live place. Brother Folden, having no children of his own, is nevertheless very deeply inter- ested in the welfare of the children of others, and spares no pains in their religious instruction ; and he has had the privilege of seeing all the regular attendants of the Sab- bath-school at Mt. Pleasant and Eight Mile Grove happily converted to God. Had we but one advice to give to ministers and lavmen, that advice would be, 'Take care of the lambs.' This is the most important work of all the departments of the Church ; and this work Brother Fol- den most faithfully performed. Under his efficient min- istry, Mt. Pleasant, Eight Mile Grove, and Weeping Water have been visited with great revivals of religion, and multitudes, old and young, have been made the re- cipients of saving grace. Over 150 have been converted to God. At Weeping Water, a church of the best lime- stone, thirty-two by sixty feet, is being erected. The walls are partly up, and the material is on the ground for its completion, and it will be finished early the coming summer. When done, it will be one of the most beautiful and substantial church edifices in the bounds of the Con- ference. There has been an increase in every department of the Church on this circuit the past year."
If we follow A. L. Folden from one charge to another, we find him building churches and holding revival meet- ings wherever he goes. At Seward, he completes a church and holds a revival at a country appointment in
214
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
1874. At Ashland in 1875, he was met, when he drove up with his goods, by a prominent official member, and told it was not wise to unload his goods; that they could not support him, and he would starve. He staid. He was blessed with a wonderful revival resulting in two hundred conversions and one hundred and fifty uniting with the Church. It is said that he made this entry in the official record : "They tried to starve me, but I would n't starve worth a cent." As might be expected, he is returned in 1876, and has a great revival at Coffman school-house, five miles north of Ashland. Among the conversions were two prize fighters, one horse racer, and a fiddler.
On the South Bend Circuit we find two new churches to his credit, and in 1878 we find him on Lincoln Cir- cuit, organizing in South Lincoln what has since become Trinity Church, the first year ; and the second, holding a revival-meeting at which over one hundred were saved. We see this consecrated man of God, full of faith and of the Holy Ghost, beginning, as he says, each day by sing- ing "Nearer, my God, to Thee," attended with a flame of revival power throughout this period, and there are over 1,000 conversions in ten years.
But others are having revivals. Isaac Burns has sixty-five conversions on the Nebraska City Circuit in 1871. Presiding elders bring in cheering reports of re- vivals from all over the field. J. J. Roberts is at Blair, but extends his work in the country, holding revivals in the cabins of the people, with inany conversions, among them William Peck, a well-educated Prussian, who af- terward became one of our ablest preachers. J. M. Adair, assisted by F. B. Pitzer, has eighty-four conversions on
.
215
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
the Arizona Circuit, and the membership of old Dakota Circuit is increased by five hundred per cent under the labors of S. P. Van Doozer; and J. W. Perkins reports ninety-three accessions on the Logan Valley Mission.
Of W. A. Presson's work at Beatrice in 1871, Presid- ing Elder Lemon has this to say : "The past year has been a most successful year at Beatrice. At the begin- ning of the Conference year there was a very small so- ciety worshiping in a small school-house. Brother W. A. Presson was appointed to this charge, and on his way from Fremont, the seat of the Conference, to Pawnee City, his former charge, he went through Beatrice, find- ing stone walls standing in a very desirable part of town, having been built for a Union Church and left uninclosed. He bought the property and raised a subscription and began a church and finished it during the year at a cost of about $5,000, and raised all the money about Beatrice except $500 borrowed from the Church Extension So- ciety, the whole being provided for by subscription. After the dedication of this church God poured out His Spirit and over eighty, many of the principal families of the town, were converted and joined the Church."
Dr. Maxfield reports that Brother Presson had a gra- cious revival the next year. The presiding elder reports that L. Oliver was blessed in 1871 with gracious revivals in some neighborhoods on the West Blue Mission, and in some cases all in the neighborhood were converted.
Presiding Elder A. G. White reports for the Omaha District in 1872, gracious revivals at Omaha, Fremont, and Schuyler. Of the Eldred Circuit the presiding elder tells the story of victory in these words :
"Eldred Mission was left to be supplied, and Richard
216
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
Pearson reappointed pastor. Brother Pearson came from England about two years ago, and on his arrival he was . received into our Church and appointed to the north half of Saunders County, in which we had no Church organ- ization. He was recommended for admission into the traveling connection one year ago, but affliction in his family prevented his attending Conference. He has la- bored the past year with great success. He is a sort of spiritual fire-brand, bearing light and heat and power all over the circuit.
"Church interests developed on his hands, demanding more help, and Daniel S. Davis was licensed to preach and appointed assistant some months ago. These brothers have given the people a rare example of Christian love for each other and for the cause of Christ. Every week has witnessed an advance.
DANIEL S. DAVIS. "The secret of their success is they have taken counsel of God and al- lowed Him to lead them; and when He leads them they go 'conquering and to conquer.' These brothers re- port over two hundred members and probationers, and they are both recommended by the District Conference for admission into the traveling connection."
During the time these devoted men worked they had about 200 conversions.
Brother Davis is returned to Wahoo Circuit the next year after being received on trial, in 1873, and as noted, began with five and ended with fourteen appointments. The way things grew in those days is well illustrated in
217
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
this incident. He sometimes traveled sixty-five miles on Sabbath and preached four times, often not having time to eat his meals. At what was called Cottonwood, he went for the first time to preach at 2.30 on the Sabbath. While preaching, a woman jumped up from her seat and cried out, addressing her husband, "Jake, you married me when I was seventeen years old, and I was a Christian then, but have been afraid to tell of it, though it has been forty years." He broke down, saying, "Why, I didn't know it." She came to the altar to rejoice that she had found courage to confess Christ before men, especially before her husband, and he came, seeking and finding the Savior. Brother Davis continued the meetings five days and the results were sixty-five conversions and a new class.
Another incident occurred during this meeting. show- ing how God's Spirit can get hold of the worst cases. Davis had visited an eccentric and noted character called "General" Dane, and been welcomed to stay if he would take care of his own horse. This Brother Davis pre- ferred to do, and staid. About daybreak one morning Dane said to him, "I want to speak to you." He led the way to a large elm-tree, and pointing to a limb, he said : "Several years ago I caught a horse thief with the stolen horse, and knowing him to be guilty, I hung him to that limb. Now, is there salvation for me?" The pastor answered, "That depends on your motive.", Dane ex- plained that before that all the horse thieves who had been caught and brought to trial had been acquitted, and he was tired of that and decided to execute one, anyhow. Davis then said: "The sin was a crimson one, but the promise is that 'though your sins be as scarlet, they shall
218
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
be white as snow ; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.'" He took courage, sought the Lord, and was happily converted.
Another case was that of a fiddler by the name of G. W. Damon. During a meeting held by Brother Davis, Damon's wife came to the altar. On the way home he told her that thing must be stopped. The next night she got ready to go to the service and he said, "If you go, 1 will leave you." She answered, "I have always been a true, obedient wife to you, but when it is a question of sav- ing my soul, I must obey God rather than man." She started to the service and he, taking his fiddle under his arm, started off in the other direction. By the time he went half a mile he said to himself aloud, "What a fool I am to leave the best woman on earth because she does not want to go to h-1." He turned at once and hastened back home, leaving his fiddle, and hurried on to the place where the service was held. She had gone in and he fol- lowed. When the invitation was given, Damon rose and said to his followers in sin: "You have been keeping step to my music, now follow me and I will play you a tune that will end in heaven." And with that he went to the altar, and altar and aisles were soon filled with penitent seekers. But Damon was not converted at the altar, and about two o'clock that night, he cried out to his wife, "Carrie, you must get up and pray for me or I will be in hell before daylight." He was gloriously converted. He was soon after licensed to preach and served the Church in after years as a supply, doing some excellent work in that capacity.
But this rapid expansion, especially during the first three years of this period, is seen in the increase of dis-
219
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
tricts. Up to 1869 there were not enough charges to make more than two districts. True, in 1865 they tried three districts, but in two years abandoned one of them and went back to two.
But in four years from 1869 there were six districts. But in nothing is this expansion seen more than in the increase in membership, from 1870 to 1874. This in- crease is over 3,000. That is, there were as many acces- sions to the Church in these four years as there had been in the entire fifteen preceding years. While from 1874 the advance is not so rapid, yet another 3,000 is added in six years, making a total of over 6,000 additions in the ten years, over twice as many as had been added in the preceding fifteen years.
It was during this third period that an era of railroad building began which determined the drift of population, built up innumerable towns that became centers of trade for the rural population, and must be seized and held by the Church. As we have seen the Union Pacific had al- ready been extended through the entire length of the center of the State in 1867, the connecting link complet- ing the great transcontinental line to the Pacific Coast having been formed at Ogden in May, 1869. Though the portion embraced within the State of Nebraska had been completed several years, for some reason there had not been attracted along its line a sufficient population, or people of such a character that even the Methodist Church could get hold of and organize into Methodist societies. Only three appointments west of Kearney, a distance of nearly 300 miles, appeared on the list as late as 1880, and only one of these, North Platte, had devel- oped any strength, and that only had a membership of
220
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
sixty-nine and five probationers. But we had already gone as far as Sidney, and were on the ground eagerly watching developments, and ready to seize any point and effect an organization at the first opportunity.
It was during this period that the great B. & M. Rail- road built its line out from Plattsmouth through the rich and populated counties of Cass, Saunders, and Lancas- ter, and the unsettled or sparsely settled counties of Sa- line, Fillmore, Clay, Adams, and Kearney. Then extend- ing south to the Republican River, pushed its line west- ward along the valley of that river through the entire length of the State, to its destination at Denver.
In the meanwhile the St. Joseph and Denver line was constructed along the Little Blue through the counties of Jefferson, Thayer, Clay, Adams, and Hall, to its destina- tion at Grand Island. In the north part of the State the Chicago, Minneapolis and St. Paul was extended from Omaha to Sioux City, and a branch of the same system was extended from Emerson thirty miles west of Sioux City to Norfolk, and the F. E. & M. V. pushed its line far to the Northwest along the valley of the Elkhorn. At the same time the Midland was built west from Nebraska City through Lincoln and Seward westward, and the Atchison line was built from the southeast corner of the. State to Lincoln.
These railroads no longer waited for settlements to be formed and then built to them, but inaugurated the new idea of sending out their experts and engineers and ascertained where settlements might be made, and built their lines into those sections of the State that best suited their purpose and took possession of the territory that naturally belonged to their system, and proceeded to de- velop it by attracting settlers.
22I
HISTORY OF NEBRASKA METHODISM.
Thesc railroads are of interest as bearing on the re- ligious development of the country. First, they have vastly increased the amount of work which presiding elders as well as bishops can do, and have frequently aided the work on the frontier by giving free transpor- tation to presiding elders, reduced rates on material for churches, in addition to the usual half-fare rates extended to all clergymen. In the next place they change and de- termine the centers of population, collecting many of the inhabitants into villages. It often happens that what were once prosperous and strong rural circuits, with churches and parsonages, are hampered or obliterated by the construction of a railroad and building of a town near by. and the building up of a church in the town. This was the case with old Mt. Pleasant, one of the strongest rural circuits, when the Missouri Pacific was extended up the Weeping Water and Nehawka estab- lished. In this way our rural work has been very much curtailed.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.