Joshua Chapel A.M.E. Church

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to pass it along right. Way down in Ellis County, in the heart of Waxahachie, there stands a church with a story worth slowin' down for. Joshua Chapel A.M.E.

Church, and that name is no accident, no sir. The congregation was organized in 1876, and they named it straight after the man who brought them together: the Reverend Joshua Goins, their first pastor. Now Reverend Goins wasn't a man who built one thing and called it a career.

That marker makes clear he went and started African Methodist Episcopal churches all across the state of Texas. Plural. Many of them.

The kind of man who plants something, watches it take root, then moves on to find the next patch of ground that needs tendin'. But this one, this one carries his name. In those early years, the congregation didn't have a grand building to worship in.

They made do with an old schoolhouse, gathered together week after week, Sunday after Sunday, holding their faith in a borrowed space. That went on until 1917, when they finally raised a sanctuary of their own. And here's where the story gets another layer worth noticin'.

The building was designed by W. S. Pittman, described right there on the marker as a noted black architect.

Pittman brought with him the influences of the Romanesque Revival style, and what went up in Waxahachie was something that announced itself. Something that said: we are here, we have been here, and we are not going anywhere. That sanctuary has since become a landmark in Waxahachie's Black community; not just a building, but a fixed point.

Named for a pastor who couldn't stop building, built by an architect people took note of, raised by a congregation that had already waited long enough. Some places earn their permanence. Joshua Chapel is one of them.

What the marker says

Organized in 1876, this congregation was named for its first pastor, the Rev. Joshua Goins, who started many African Methodist Episcopal churches across the state. Worshipers met in an old schoolhouse until this sanctuary was constructed in 1917. Designed by noted black architect W. S. Pittman, the building exhibits influences of the Romanesque Revival style and has become a landmark in Waxahachie's black community. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1984