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| Our History |
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A HUNDRED YEAR GLANCE
It began in 1896 when the nineteenth century with its agrarian society was giving way to twentieth-century industrial society. America was in the midst of one of the worst depressions in its history; seven-eighths of the wealth of the country was controlled by one-eighth of the people. In a bitter presidential election, William McKinley defeated William Jennings Bryan on a platform advocating “hard money” and high tariffs. It was also an exciting age. The hydroelectric plant opened at Niagara Falls, the first moving pictures on a public screen were shown in New York City, Utah was admitted as the forty-fifth state, book matches became popular, free rural mail delivery began, the first comic strip “The Yellow Kid” appeared, and the first modern Olympic games were held in Athens, Greece. Religion was foremost on the minds of people. They flocked to see and hear Billy Sunday with his pulpit-thumping evangelism, advocating Bible fundamentalism and Prohibition. The best-selling books were Quo Vadis, the story of the early Christians during Nero’s reign; The Damnation of Theron Ware, a realistic novel about a hypocritical small-town Methodist minister; and In His Steps, the story of a Kansas minister who followed the example of Christ. In Houston, the politicians and businessmen were making plans to dredge Buffalo Bayou to twenty-five feet and an inspector had found the bayou polluted by a dead cow, privies, and drainage through a small-pox graveyard. But ordinary families went on with life...moving, marrying, and birthing children... striving for the good life offered each American. Pasadena was a name on a map and a land developer’s dream when Will and Katie Bailey and their son Will, Jr., moved from Ennis to Pasadena in 1896 to be closer to family. Katie’s sister, Mary Jane, and her husband Robert Guinn and daughter Katie lived in Deepwater. Will’s mother Martha and stepfather Josiah Rawlins soon followed. These families were the solid citizens that would help to build a town. They were church-going people. They attended the non-denominational Union Congregation in Deepwater, where a Presbyterian minister preached. Then in 1896 with the help of Peter E. Nicholson, a Methodist minister who was in the Texas Conference as early as 1877 and who in 1905 was appointed to the Genoa circuit, they formed a Methodist “Society” in Deepwater that met in their homes. Their ministers were either local preachers or supply preachers from the conference, usually young men just beginning their careers and assigned to circuits. In 1898, the Methodists moved their worship services to Pasadena, not because most of them lived here but probably to escape the threat of malaria and yellow fever and because they could meet in the new schoolhouse. On June 14, 1898, their minister, S.W. Warner, officially received seven members into the Methodist Episcopal Church South, of Pasadena, Texas. Robert Guinn, Will and Katie Bailey and Martha Rawlins entered by “certificate,” and Will, Jr., Katie Guinn, and Lydia Zlomke took the vows of the church. By 1904, the congregation had twenty members, and they began to plan for the church’s future. Will Bailey, Robert Guinn, and Horace Plum (a newcomer and a handyman who owned a small pear orchard) each bought one lot on Shaver Street and gave them to the church. Because the property was to be used for a church J. O. Ross, the son-in-law of Col. J. H. Burnett who developed Pasadena, sold them the lots at half price—$12.50 each. In 1907, eleven years and six ministers into their history, the twenty members opened the doors of their first church building. Under the leadership of the Rev. O. F. Zimmerman, they built an impressive L-shaped, Gothic structure with a tall steeple and a bell. A large gully off Little Vince Bayou ran alongside it and a white fence of criss-cross boards enclosed the bare churchyard. It cost $2300, or $150 per member. Within the next year, the membership increased by 50%. This sanctuary was succeeded by three others in 1938, 1955, and 1986. Then, in 1908, the first minister appointed by the Texas Conference to “Pasadena Station” arrived. His annual salary was $765. Horace Moreland Whaling was also the first clergyman to administer the sacrament of baptism in the Pasadena Methodist church. He was a young and handsome intellectual, just returned from the North Texas Conference. He later became a Vice-President of S.M.U. As Pasadena grew from village to city, so grew the church— from 7 members in 1896 to 2470 in 1996. Its buildings have been grand, built for the glory of God, built to make its people look upward when they pass and inward when the enter. Its forty-one ministers have been people of varied personalities and interests and talents—some like Thomas Price and Jay Horton have been preachers, some teachers like Walter McPherson and Don Little, or spiritual healers like Joe Wells, some builders like D. D. McGaughy, Nace Crawford, and Lloyd Giles, and some administrators like Harold Fagan. In a mobile, industrialized society, it has been a place to call home. Its people have followed the vision of its founders— of a Methodist family of believers, of Christian education, of the enhancement of life through its architecture and music, of civic-minded members who understand that community and church are interdependent, and most important, of a willingness to encounter the future with and for God. Anne Thomas |
Sunday Church Services
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The history of First United Methodist Church is the story of its people and their leaders, of their everyday lives and their vision, of daily prayers and divine guidance.