# Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1912_S34
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

34 Proceedings of the twenty-fourth convention

25 Sunday school children. The simple chapel and one acre of land have a value of $250.00.

Albemarle in Stanly Co., eight or ten miles from Gold Hill, is a hopeful place. Population: 8000. Pastor Ford opened a school here in October 1911. Opponents at once started an opposition school. On the first day of school he had only five children. But little by little the number rose to 65. Through his faithful work he has won not only the hearts of the children but also of the parents. Those who were at first against him now praise his school as the best in the whole neighborhood. On May 17 the closing exercises took place in a large church. About 350 persons were present. Pastor Ford has preached in Albemarle once a month. We have no property here yet.

f. Charlotte, Mecklenburg Co. Here on May 20, 1775, the historic Mecklenburg Declaration was adopted. Charlotte has 35,000 inhabitants, of whom one third are Negroes. We now have three congregations there.

St. Paul's. (Missionaries: the Negro preachers John McDavid and Calvin P. Thompson.) The congregation consists of 93 souls, 46 communicants and 7 voting members. In the last quarter 14 persons were dismissed to the newly founded Bethel congregation. The school, in which McDavid and Frank D. Alston (Negro) work, has 93 pupils, the Sunday school 75. Teacher Alston and Missionary McDavid are very industrious. In the last quarter they made 700 visits. Value of the property: $3500.00.

Bethel Church is located in the northwestern part of Charlotte, which is called by the name Greenville. Here Missionary McDavid opened a school on September 4, 1911. Many Negroes live there, many of whom own their own homes. School and services were held in an old chapel belonging to a thoroughly fanatical sectarian congregation. The young congregation had to look for another place. For various reasons it was thought necessary to build a chapel. The lot costs $400.00, the chapel $525.00. The building costs us so little because our two missionaries and Teacher Alston did most of the construction work. Our Negro Christians in Charlotte contributed $125.00 for the chapel. The remainder must be paid from the mission treasury. The intention was to dedicate the new chapel on the last Sunday in July or the first Sunday in August. The congregation was organized on April 21, 1912, and numbers 16 souls, 11 communicants and 3 voting members. There were 55 children in the school, 36 in the Sunday school. Missionary Thompson now takes care of the work at the new station. In the last quarter he made 462 visits. Mr. Andreas Werling of Ossian, Ind., gave the congregation a new organ.

Meyersville, Mount Zion. This station lies one and a half miles east of the center of the city of Charlotte and numbers 33 sou-