In December 1877, the first service was held, and then a three week revival was held in January of 1878, at which 68 charter members joined. They were a Missionary Baptist Church and were affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Lowell Houts’ ancestors, Cheryl Snead’s ancestors, and the Seat family were instrumental in getting the congregation formed. Back in those days, the population of Allen Township was 1,750, as compared to 175 today. The love of missions was still evident with the descendants of the New Hope congregation; the late Carolyn Houts, sister of Lowell, spent 30 years in the mission field in Ghana (Africa).
Starting in 1920, the population and membership began to decline as mechanization meant fewer farmers were necessary. The church’s last service was held in 1951. In 2003, the building was refurbished and the congregation’s 125th anniversary was celebrated. A homecoming has been celebrated every year since. “This is a very sacred spot for us,” said Lowell Houts Sunday.
Besides New Hope, there were several other Baptist congregations in the eastern half of Worth County. There was Rock Creek, Denver, Allendale, and Pleasant Hill (afterwards Assembly of God).
Two friends of the New Hope Church, Don Beavers and Carolyn Houts, passed away last year and were remembered Sunday. One morning, Don got up Sunday, sat down with his coffee and morning paper, and never got up. Carolyn came home from a singing concert with Linda Phipps and told her to go on home, that she would be fine after Linda had helped her get seated. Carolyn never got up again. “That’s the way I’d like to go,” said Lowell.
The Worth County Community Band performed at the reunion, playing numbers as recent as Herb Alpert along with some of the old hymns that were sung at New Hope.
Kathy Ridge of the Pony Express and Andrew County Museums came up and performed. She impersonated Sue Hutchison Adams, who was related to the John Adams family, and whose father owned slaves in St. Charles County before the Civil War, or the War Between the States, as Ridge called it. “There was nothing civil about it,” she said.
Despite the fact that the family owned slaves, the Adams family had divided loyalties, with two of her brothers joining the union while one joined the confederates. Sue Adams joined with the South.
Posing as a Presbyterian Missionary, Adams was able to smuggle supplies and information about Union troop positions to the Confederates. The surrender of General Lee and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln shocked the country, and the economy was decimated.
Adams’ father had insisted that her daughter be well-educated, and she had learned about how the ancient Greeks had decorated the graves following their wars. In 1865, after the war had ended and the nation was still in shock over the events that had taken place, Adams and a group of likeminded women went to a local Confederate cemetery and decorated all the graves of the soldiers, even the Union soldiers that were buried there. The idea spread like wildfire, and by 1868, Decoration Day had become a holiday.
Two members of Adams’ family later moved to the area; one moved to Andrew County, while another moved to Buchanan.
Back in those days, there were many customs, superstitions, and rituals regarding the dead. A woman mourned her husband for two and a half years, divided into three different mourning periods. One such period lasted a full year, while another period lasted 9 months to a year, while another lasted six months.
Women back in those days were always surrounded by death, even when there was no Civil War. Many mothers died in childbirth, while influenza, cancer, and contagious diseases were common. One out of every four Confederate soldiers was killed during the Civil War, and for every three who were killed in battle, there were five who were killed by diseases.
People would send invitations to funerals, including with wreaths from hair from the deceased person. Doors of a house in mourning had black yarn, which meant that people were not to knock on the door.
There were frequently professional mourners, and people would stop their clocks at the time of death. Dead bodies were always supposed to be taken feet first; if they were taken head first, there was a superstition that they would come back to haunt the place.
Bodies were closely watched for three days to ensure they would not come back to life. Even with that precaution, Ridge recounted one instance in Andrew County in the 1870’s in which the pallbearers of a 90 year old man who had fought in the War of 1812 dropped the casket and the man came back to life; he would go on to live another 10 years.
People had a paranoia back in those days about waking up buried alive in a coffin. Common sale items in those days were a chain that would be wrapped around the deceased person’s hand and a hole on the tombstone to put it through, with a bell. If someone was declared deceased prematurely, they could ring the bell in hopes that someone would hear it and they would be rescued. “It happened more often than we think,” said Ridge.
Ridge did a presentation on Flag Day, which will be June 14th this year. On June 14th, 1775, the Continental Army was founded and George Washington was made its commander. In 1777, they adopted a flag of 13 stars and 13 stripes. Later, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed June 14th Flag Day.
Elizabeth Briscoe was born into a Quaker family in 1752, and she was sent to school and apprenticed as a sewer. Despite prohibitions against intermarriage, Briscoe married John Ross, an Episcopalian, and was disfellowshiped from her meeting, but became Betsy Ross. John Ross was killed in the Revolutionary War in 1776. In 1777, she was asked by a committee of three, including Washington, to design a flag. She accepted Washington’s design with a simple change of turning the six-pointed star into five points. It turned out that it is possible to make a five-pointed star with one cut, making it easier to produce.
Ross later rejoined the Quakers and married twice more. Her second husband was also killed in the war, while her third husband died in 1817. She lived until 1836.
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