DUANE
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Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Two separate congregations, one future church: and the story starts way back before either of them knew the other existed. It begins in 1868, when a man named Joshua Addington started a Sunday School.
That's it. That's the whole seed. A Sunday School.
But from that modest beginning grew something called the Dallas City Mission. Now the Mission didn't sit still; it eventually formed Floyd Street Church, and then in 1880, Haskell Avenue Church was organized. Two fellowships, running on parallel tracks, doing their work, building their communities.
You might wonder how long those two tracks could run side by side without meeting. Turns out, about two decades. In 1902, at the North Texas Annual Conference, Floyd Street Church and Haskell Avenue Church merged.
They came together and formed Grace Methodist Church. Now, they had the name and they had the congregation, but what they didn't have yet was a permanent place to gather. So what do you do while you're waiting on a real building?
You erect a temporary tabernacle right there on the back of the lot. Not glamorous, but it held them. Then in 1903, just one year later, the first portion of this structure was completed.
They went from a tabernacle in the backyard to actual walls and a roof. And the building kept evolving. By 1925, after remodeling, an educational unit was added.
One Sunday School started by Joshua Addington in 1868. By 1925, there was a whole educational unit to hold what that seed had grown into. That's the long game, right there.
What the marker says
This congregation has grown from two earlier fellowships. In 1868 Joshua Addington started a Sunday School, the beginning of the Dallas City Mission. Later the Mission formed Floyd Street Church and in 1880 Haskell Avenue Church was organized. At the North Texas Annual Conference in 1902, the two congregations merged to form Grace Methodist Church. A temporary tabernacle was erected on the back of this lot. In 1903 the first portion of this structure was completed. After remodeling in 1925, the educational unit was added.