USA > Ohio > The Church of the Brethren in northeastern Ohio > Part 5
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THE BROOKPARK CHURCH, CLEVELAND
In February 1955 a national teaching mission held in the Cleveland Heights church in East Cleveland revealed a pressing need for another church in the southwestern area of Greater Cleveland. Fellowship meetings, begun during the same month, were held on alternate Sunday and Friday
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evenings in the homes of interested families in the area. In May 1955 an official request to the interchurch relations committee of the Cleveland Church Federation for comity rights in the area of Brookpark Village was immediately granted.
An interim period for study and planning followed, during which the challenge and the need were kept alive by a few keenly interested families and several district leaders of vision.
COMMUNITY CHURCH
The Brookpark Church
In July 1956 a place of meeting was found in the Brookpark Memorial school. Brookpark Village is adjacent to Cleveland's southwestern city limits. Covering an area of eight to ten square miles, it has a population of about three thousand, which is increasing at the rate of seven hundred to one thousand a year. In this strategic location seven acres of land adjacent to the school were purchased by the district of Northeastern Ohio.
Charles Anderson began his pastorate and meetings were started in November 1956. Forty-five people attended the first service. They were officially organized as a congregation on
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Pentecost Sunday, June 9, 1957, certificates of charter mem- bership being presented to fifty-one persons.
Pastor Anderson having resigned in the summer of 1958, Donald Flory began pastoral service on December 1 of that year; he remained with us until 1961. Mervin Cripe of Claypool, Indiana, became our pastor on September 1, 1961.
February 14, 1960, was a happy day for the Brookpark congregation. The first unit of buildings, including a sanctuary and an educational wing, was dedicated. Already (1962) the educational facilities are overcrowded.
Opportunities in this rapidly growing community seem unlimited. The church is making rapid strides under the leadership of Brother Cripe. With the attendance taxing the facilities, the mission board hopes that before very long it can provide additional space. The membership in 1962 is ninety-two.
THE CANTON FIRST CHURCH
According to available records, the beginning of what is now known as the Canton First Church of the Brethren dates back to about 1850. At that time certain zealous members of the Canton Center congregation became interested in trying to start a mission in the city. Some of the interested families were those of Conrad Kahler, Josiah Keim, and Samuel Sprankel, with Brethren Kahler and Keim doing the preaching.
In 1887, members of the families then residing in Canton requested John F. Kahler, son of Conrad Kahler, to take charge of the mission work in the city. He responded to the call. The first recorded regular place of worship was in the Rowland house, located in the southeast section of the city. At that place our first Sunday school was started in 1897.
This original location, however, was not considered very desirable. The old Bethel house, located a short distance west of the East Nimishillen Creek bridge on the south side of East Tuscarawas Street, was rented, and all services were moved to that place. There the operations of the mission were continued until the fall of 1904, under the leadership of J. F.
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Kahler, William Quinn, E. S. Young, Edson Ulery, and others. The Young and Ulery families, having moved to Canton from North Manchester, Indiana, about 1902, were of great aid to the mission work here.
The first steps toward organizing a city church, taken on July 24, 1902, were completed on December 23 of that year. Canton City was to be the name of the organization. Its charter membership numbered approximately twenty-nine, and its territory was to extend to the corporate limits of the city.
In the fall of 1904 the Canton Bible Institute (or College) was opened by E. S. Young on the northwest corner of Oxford Avenue and 14th Street, N.W. The chapel and the necessary classrooms were made available to the church for its regular Sunday-school and worship services. The offer was appreciated and accepted, and all operations were transferred to the Bible Institute building. There, with the aid and the encouragement of the institute instructors and the student body from nearby states and points in Ohio outside of the city, both the church and the Sunday school grew rapidly. Also a number of happy romances sprang up; some persons can testify as to the many pleasant associations we had then and yet continue to enjoy.
By the latter part of 1907, however, the college project failed and most of the instructors and the students left for points outside of the Canton area. The local congregation was permitted to continue its regular services for a while longer in the vacant building, but when Brother Young sold the property to the city of Canton on July 19, 1910, as a site for the proposed Lehman high school, the building had to be torn down. The church therefore had to arrange for another place in which to carry on its services. Brother Young owned a nearby six-room dwelling on 14th Street; this was offered to the church on the condition that the lease would terminate immediately if and when the property was sold. His offer was accepted and all services were carried on in that dwelling until the spring of 1912. Preaching services required the entire first floor, and all available space was used by the Sunday school. It became a veritable beehive, full of buzz and activity, and the attendance was considered good.
In the spring of 1912 this dwelling house was sold, and then it again became necessary to do something quickly if the
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regular services were to be carried on without cessation and loss of interest. The district home mission board was appealed to for financial aid toward the construction of a badly needed church house. However, the board had been active in the promotion of the mission work in Akron and in trying to raise the necessary funds to erect a suitable house of worship when the Akron church should be organized. Therefore it was not in a position to back the Canton congregation in a building program. The board did, however, grant permission to the congregation to canvass the district direct for any possible financial aid it might be able to secure in that manner.
To meet the immediate need, the local membership decided to raise a fund of five hundred dollars to cover the approximate cost of materials, and to volunteer the necessary labor to erect a rough board structure two lots east of where our present church house now stands. The size of this temporary structure was thirty-six feet by forty-eight feet; it was simply boarded up on the outside and roofed. Its open foundation permitted the free passage of the wintry breezes beneath the entire floor. A number of small windows provided light and ventilation. No plaster or insulation was used anywhere. At first two round cannon stoves and the rough board seats comprised the entire furnishings. After a time the young people found an old organ somewhere for ten dollars, got the key to the building, and set the organ inside without first giving any formal announcement. That organ was the first musical instrument ever set inside the Canton church, and it was among the first ever to be used or permitted inside any church in the district.
Although the wooden tabernacle building was not intended to become a permanent place of worship, it served that purpose from the spring of 1912 until the early spring of 1914. The attendance and the interest held up remarkably well. It was not often too hot in winter or too cool in midsummer. The members were in earnest and never lost sight of the need for and their intention to build a larger and better house of worship. Certain members in the district were personally canvassed by a representative of the congregation, and the members of the congregation were recanvassed for pledges. The interest shown therein resulted in a move by the council on December 12, 1912, to start building in the spring of 1913.
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The plans for a new brick structure had been carefully studied and approved, but the place of location was not finally decided until May 15, 1913.
The cornerstone was laid in December 1913, the following articles being sealed therein: a Bible; a copy of the Gospel Messenger; a copy of the Missionary Visitor; a few tracts; a picture of the former tabernacle-type building; a list of the church and Sunday-school officers; a list of the members of the congregation; a list of the members of the building and advisory committees; the names of all contributors to the building fund up to that time.
The new building was completed as planned, at an approximate cost of seven thousand dollars plus a very considerable amount of hard labor freely donated by various members of the congregation. W. D. Keller was secured to preach the dedicatory sermon on February 1, 1914.
The next important step taken was the securing of a full-time pastor. Those having served the congregation in that capacity were installed in the following order.
Howard L. Alley June 9, 1915
George S. Strausbaugh
W. D. Keller April 1, 1917
July 5, 1918
F. L. Irvin January 1, 1922
I. J. Gibson July 29, 1923
J. C. Inman January 4, 1924
R. L. Sherfy January 1, 1941
J. C. Middlekauff October 10, 1944
G. W. Bowlby July 22, 1947
(Dale A. Young interim pastor until the
arrival of Brother Dubble)
Curtis C. Dubble July 1, 1952
When Brother Strausbaugh gave up the pastorate, the congregation purchased his residence at a price of fifty-six hundred dollars for use as a permanent parsonage.
At the time the Canton City church was organized, J. F. Kahler and J. Edson Ulery were elders living in the city. E. S. Young was ordained to the eldership soon afterward. Curtis Dubble was ordained to that office on June 2, 1954.
Howard H. Helman, Roland Showalter, Phillip Griffith, and John W. Meyers, former members of this congregation, were
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ordained to the ministry here. Other ministers who have resided within the boundaries of the Canton City church at one time or another are M. Clyde Horst, Stanley Noffsinger, William Wade, Peter Brubaker, T. S. Moherman, G. W. Kieffaber, Walter M. Kahle, and Tobias Hoover.
Frank Weaver, Ulides Snyder, Charles Goughnour, Albert Rennecker, William Lantz, George Goughnour, C. C. Bender, William Griffith, Howard Royer, Charles Messer, Levi Summers, Arnold Hanna, Foster Berkebile, David Masters, Harper Bender, Isaac Olinger, W. H. Barkey, Howard Neff, Harold Miller, Raymond Brumbaugh, and Roger Clouser have served the church as deacons.
On January 9, 1920, by order of the church council, the name of the congregation on Arnold Avenue, N.W., was changed from the Canton City church to the First Church of the Brethren.
A mission was opened in the northeast section of the city by workers from the First church in 1923. It was first operated from the Gibbs Avenue school but later was transferred to a dwelling house on Maple Avenue, N.E., where the work continued until the home mission board took it over and organized the Maple Avenue church. The formal organization
The Canton First Church
FEEL
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of this church necessitated the transfer of forty-two names from the membership roll of the First church. Despite the release of these members to the newly organized church and the loss of their personal and financial aid, the activities and the attendance of the First church continued to grow until more rooms were needed for church-school classes and other increasing activities.
A building fund committee was chosen by the council in April 1945 to plan for raising funds for and to study plans for remodeling, or adding to, the church building. This committee, composed of Harper K. Bender, Harold C. Masters, Howard Neff, and Mrs. Roger Clouser, presented numerous plans to the church from time to time, as well as reports of the progress being made toward the raising of the necessary funds.
On October 24, 1948, the church council approved plans for the construction of an annex to the north side of the church house. The building fund committee was then instructed to proceed as a building committee, to arrange for the purchase of all building materials required, and to oversee the construction of the proposed annex. The further work of raising funds by subscription, or otherwise, was placed in the hands of a promotional fund committee composed of Raymond Brumbaugh, Harold Miller, Roger Clouser, Dale Hartong, and A. Ray Walters.
By tireless effort on the part of the building committee, and many hours of actual labor freely volunteered by members of the congregation and their friends, the annex was completed at an approximate cost of twenty thousand dollars. The dedicatory services were held on October 30, 1949, with Rufus D. Bowman, president of Bethany Biblical Seminary, preaching the dedicatory sermon. G. S. Strausbaugh, W. D. Keller, J. C. Inman, and R. L. Sherfy, former pastors, were present and had parts in the dedicatory service. The new annex has relieved the crowded conditions and has made it possible to carry on more efficiently the full program of the church and the church school.
On Sunday, September 26, 1954, the fifty-second anniver- sary and organ dedication service was held. The historical record whose essence appears in the foregoing pages was prepared by C. C. Bender and read at the request of the program committee. On the program appeared the following:
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Paul M. Robinson, president of Bethany Biblical Seminary, guest speaker; George Mader, guest organist; J. Ray Berkebile, guest soloist.
In February of 1960 our congregation again saw the need of more facilities for our church school. A building committee was appointed for the purpose of drawing up plans and securing a contractor for renovation of the church basement under the main sanctuary. The committee members were Duane Wagner, Donald Cake, Harold Masters, Kenneth Boydelatour, and Ralph Davis. The remodeling consisted of adding church-school rooms, a nursery, and new restrooms and of enlarging the kitchen at a cost of approximately twelve thousand dollars.
A need for new deacons being felt, in 1958 Harold C. Masters and in 1961 Dale Hartong were elected to that office.
On August 1, 1961, Richard C. Wenger assumed the pastoral duties of the First church.
THE CANTON MAPLE AVENUE CHURCH
The Canton Maple Avenue church had its beginning in the Gibbs schoolhouse on June 13, 1926. Then it was felt that it would be good for it to move to the schoolhouse on Maple Avenue, where it met for a short time. Later it moved to a house at 1815 17th Street, N.E., where services were held each Sunday until the church building could be erected.
The Maple Avenue mission was an outgrowth of the Canton First church, with many of the first members transferring from the mother church. The lots at the corner of 17th Street and Maple Avenue were purchased for six hundred dollars in December 1926. The building committee was made up of Daniel Lantz, Joseph Miller, and Thomas Stump. Ground was broken on January 5, 1927; the cornerstone was laid on February 6; the building was dedicated on April 3, 1927, with Edward Shepfer giving the dedicatory address. The cost of the structure was approximately seven thousand, five hundred dollars, the district mission board giving three hundred dollars toward this work. The elders-in-charge during this organiza- tion period were J. C. Inman and John F. Kahler. Elva (Mrs.
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Thomas) K. Stump was the first Sunday-school superintendent.
With the help of the home mission board, the church was organized on October 29, 1931, the first presiding elder being David Stuckey. The trustees were Hubert Holland, Charles Robinson, Joseph Paulus, Ira Dickerhoof, and Mary Priest. Other officials elected were Walter Doerschuk, treasurer; Dora Hickman, secretary; Ira Dickerhoof, Sunday-school superin- tendent; and Daniel Lantz, clerk. The first pastor was John F.
IT
The Canton Maple Avenue Church
Kahler, who served until his death on November 12, 1934; assisting him was William Wade. There were forty-two charter members. The women's fellowship was organized on November 20, 1930, with nine members. Deacon D. L. Klenzman moved into the congregation on April 4, 1934.
An interesting incident that is recalled by the first superintendent is that there were twenty-eight primary children who prayed twenty-eight minutes for the new church just a short time before the plans for it became definite.
Some details as to personnel follow. Ira Dickerhoof was elected as a deacon in 1937. Ora DeLauter served as pastor from 1934 to 1937; Walter M. Young from 1935 to 1938; David Stuckey from 1938 to 1940; Dwight Horner from 1940 to 1943;
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Peter Kauffman from 1943 to 1944. John Myers was called to the ministry on September 1, 1944, was licensed to preach, February 4, 1945, was ordained to the ministry on October 14, 1945, and was ordained to the eldership on October 4, 1948. He served as pastor until he resigned and moved his membership to the Tampa, Florida, church on February 4, 1957.
An addition to the church building, started on July 14, 1948, increased the amount of church-school room available. The addition was dedicated on April 3, 1949, the twenty-second anniversary of the church dedication, with Elder Wilmer A. Petry delivering the dedicatory address and Elders J. D. Zigler and A. B. Replogle sharing in the service.
The church purchased the parsonage at 1619 16th Street, N.E., in September 1957. An older house, it was completely renovated by redecoration, the modernizing of the kitchen, the installation of a downstairs lavatory, and the making of some repairs.
Perry Hoover came to be our pastor in 1957 and served through 1959, when Walter E. Coldren assumed the position.
The membership of the church has remained somewhat constant, averaging about one hundred twenty-five throughout the years. The church is looking forward to paying off a small balance on the parsonage and then to adding to the present church structure since room is sorely needed. The congregation became self-supporting in 1956. Up until that time the mission board had been caring for a part of its support.
THE CENTER CHURCH
The Nimishillen church, founded in 1804, grew so rapidly that by 1825 or a few years earlier it became necessary to form a new congregation. There were three ministers living south of the new dividing line at the time of the organization: George Hoke, an ordained elder; George Shively, a son-in-law of George Hoke; and Jacob Snyder. Elder Hoke was chosen to have the oversight of the new congregation, which was named the Canton church after Canton, the seat of Stark County.
Little is known about the early years of the Canton church;
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no written records of the congregation were kept until about 1868, and the earliest of these records have been lost or destroyed.
Brother Hoke lived in the Nimishillen congregation from 1826 to 1842. Elder Shively was selected to follow him and held the oversight of the church until 1857, when he moved to Indiana. Elder Snyder was Brother Shively's successor. After he died in 1865 his son-in-law, Daniel Peck, had the oversight of the church until his death on August 20, 1871.
The first church house was built in 1868 on an acre of land in Nimishillen Township purchased from Benjamin B. Bollinger. The building was forty-four feet long and thirty- eight feet wide, with brick walls a foot thick.
John B. Shoemaker became the nonresident elder in 1871. Brother Shoemaker was also in charge of his home church in Smithville; because of the heavy burden of his duties he resigned the charge of the Canton church in favor of Moses Weaver, who had moved here from Ashland. In 1878, Brother Weaver moved back to Michigan. After a short vacancy, Conrad Kahler was named to the presiding eldership. At the time he was nonresident, but in 1882 he moved into the congregation, serving until his death on October 1, 1892.
In 1878 a thirty-eight- by forty-foot addition was built onto the church for the purpose of holding love feast services. Tables ten feet long by two feet wide were cut from single pieces of poplar lumber; they are still in use.
At a regular council meeting in 1878, Peter Eby and others offered to build a church house at Mount Pleasant without any expense to the church if regular services would be held there. This house was to be built after the plan of the original part of the Canton house. The request was granted and it was agreed that, when the new church was completed, Sunday-school and preaching services would be held there every other Sunday. In 1891, Brother Eby and other interested persons requested and received permission to build an addition forty feet long by forty feet wide to this house for the purpose of holding love feasts.
Samuel Sprankel, a nonresident elder, was chosen on October 27, 1892, to have the oversight of the congregation with Noah Longanecker as his assistant. At the regular council meeting of May 5, 1917, Elder Sprankel proposed that Elders
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Adam H. Miller and Milton M. Taylor hold the oversight of the church jointly. After the adoption of his recommendation, Elder Sprankel presented his resignation.
By 1902 the membership of the church in Canton had grown to such an extent that it was thought best to make a separate congregation of it. The district home mission board requested on December 20, 1902, that the members of the Canton church living in the city be formed into a new congregation. The request was granted with the understanding that the new church be called the Canton City church and the older congregation remain the Canton Center church. But in time this became confusing and on August 11, 1926, the church requested the district meeting that the Canton Center church be known as the Center church. This request was granted.
On June 4, 1911, a cyclone badly damaged the original church building. The newer structure was completely de- stroyed by the same cyclone and has never been rebuilt. The older church was repaired at a cost of more than a thousand dollars. In 1924 the church was remodeled. Sunday-school rooms were built and a furnace was installed at a cost of two thousand dollars. In 1934, new windows and seats were in- stalled at a cost of eleven hundred dollars.
Adam Miller was elected to the ministry and served until 1918. Elder Taylor remained in charge of the church from May 11, 1918, to July 10, 1946. The system of the free ministry under which the church had functioned since its founding was discontinued May 12, 1923, when Brother Taylor was installed as pastor. Ira W. Moomaw and Elmer Frick were elected to the ministry in 1919.
The Sunday school was started about 1871. There was at first a great deal of opposition to the proposal, but at last permission was secured to use the church in the afternoons. The school was held six months of the year, with no instruction during the winter. However, only a few years had passed before Sunday school was held before the preaching service in the forenoon; by 1895 it convened every Sunday. New activities were added from time to time. As far back as 1885 a children's day was an annual event. The home department was started in 1908, and the cradle roll a few years later. The Sunday-school board (now the board of Christian education) was started in 1920. Separate classrooms were constructed in 1924.
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Superintendents of the church school have been Josiah Keim, Lewis Hang, John H. Miller, James Hang, Daniel Yutzey, Samuel Friend, Milton Taylor, Adam Miller, Frank Burkart, William Horner, John Hochstetler, Maurice Cluts, Leroy Domer, Esther Horner, Rachel Mohn, Walter Riemen- schneider, Galen Young, Arthur Royer, Harold Weyand, Kathryn Weyand Lavy, James Royer, Roland Robinson, Mora Dickerson, William Scott, John Royer, and Wilbur Mohn.
A Christian workers society, founded May 30, 1908, was the beginning of the regular Sunday evening services at the Center church. The first officers of the group were A. F. Shriver, president, Florence Yutzey, secretary, and A. H. Miller, treasurer.
A sisters' aid society was requested at a regular business meeting on March 21, 1913. The sisters were instructed to prepare a constitution and outline the purpose of the organization. The constitution and the outline were heard and approved on May 23, 1913. At this time the society was directed to make an annual report as the other departments did. The presidents of the group have been Rachel Mohn, Savilla Taylor, Florence Royer, Lelia Hershey, Lotisha Seefong,
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