Amelia Beatrice ELLINGBOE

• Notes	At least one living or private individual is linked to this note - Details withheld.
  Person ID	I757	Ellingboe
  Last Modified	24 Feb 2012

  
  

  Marriage	Historic First Baptist Church. Historic Beale Street Baptist Church Beverly G. Bond Historic Beale Street Baptist Church, located at the corner of Beale and Fourth, is one of the oldest African Ameri can congregations in Memphis. The congregation originated in praise meetings of free blacks and slaves in the home of a white minister, Reverend Scott Keys. The African American participants had left the local African Church because of disagreements with some of that church's Primitive Baptist beliefs and practices. The praise meetings were led by white ministers until 1864 when Morris Henderson was ordained and became the group's pastor. The congregation also held services in the basement of a white church on Beale until this building was destroyed by fire in 1865. Black Baptists then met in a brush arbors at Lauderdale and Beale, and later at Beale and Fourth (formerly Desoto) Street. In 1865, the women of the church raised enough money at a church fair to enable Reverend Henderson to buy lumber and construct a crude shelter. The church membership grew as thousands of rural freedpeople flocked to the Memphis during and after the Civil War. So much money was raised at Sunday services that a large table had to be set up for counting the collection; and shovels and tubs were used for handling the money. The American Baptist Home Mission Society of New York donated a lot on Beale, and, in 1871, the cornerstone was laid for the present building, designed by Edward C. Jones and M.H. Baldwin. The congregation worked for the next twenty-two years to raise money to pay for the edifice. Morris Henderson served as the church's pastor from 1864 until his death in 1877. Henderson helped establish day and Sabbath schools and Zion Cemetery. He also encouraged church members to support the local branch of the Freedmen's Savings Bank. Between 1877 and the early 1890s, the city's turbulent political and social climate affected Beale Street Baptist Church. Internal conflicts led to the resignation of Reverend R. N. Countee in 1882. His successor, Reverend Taylor Nightingale was co-owner, along with Ida B. Wells and J. L. Fleming, of The Free Speech and Headlight. The newspaper was published in the basement of the church until Wells bought out Nightingale's interest. Beale Street Baptist also hosted visits from presidents Ulysses S. Grant and Theodore Roosevelt. The twin towers of Beale Street Baptist Church were originally adorned by a cupola-like structure with square piers supporting arches topped by a Celtic cross and by a statue of St. John the Baptist with his arm pointing toward heaven. The cupola structure fell into the nave of the church before 1885. The St. John statue atop the other tower was struck by lightning several times before a drunken intruder hacked off one of the arms. In 1938, the statue was destroyed when workmen dropped it while they were trying to repair damage from another lightning strike. The church remains an imposing structure with wide aisles, stain glass windows and a magnificent mural above the sanctuary. Adjacent to Beale Street Baptist Church is Church's Park and a monument to Church's Auditorium. The park's founder, Robert R. Church, Sr., was the South's first African American millionaire and father of Mary Church Terrell. Church purchased land for the park in the late nineteenth century and built a two-thousand-seat auditorium that served as a center for African American cultural, recreational and civic activities. W. C. Handy was orchestra leader at Church's park and auditorium. Theodore Roosevelt addressed an audience at the auditorium in 1902 and the Memphis branch of the NAACP was organized there in 1917. The auditorium also served as the meeting place for the Lincoln League--established in 1916 by Republican political leader Robert R. Church, Jr.--to register and train African American voters and to pay poll taxes. Across the street from Beale Street Baptist Church is the Solvent Savings Bank Building. Established by Robert R. Church, Sr. in 1906, Solvent Savings Bank was the first African American bank in the city. In 1908, when Beale Street Baptist Church was in danger of closing because of debts, Solvent Savings repaid the church's notes and saved it from sale. Beverly G. Bond is associate professor of history at the University of Memphis. OAH Newsletter. Copyright (c) Organization of American Historians. All rights reserved.
  Family ID	F671	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart