Saint John Baptist Church

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Saint John Baptist Church in Wichita County. Now settle in, because this is a story about a community that built something, watched it burn, and built it back bigger every single time. It starts, as so many Texas stories do, with a plat of land.

June 1884, the Grainger and Ballow Addition was laid out in what would come to be called the Eastside, and that neighborhood became the center of African American life in Wichita Falls. Fast forward to November 1905, and you've got a small circle of determined people gathering to do something lasting. Rev.

W.M. Massey, Charles and Susan Frizzell Craft, Andrew Byrd, William Johnson, and Lizzie Scott Richardson organized Saint John Baptist Church, the third congregation of the Black community in that area. And here's a detail worth holding onto: Mrs.

Richardson is the one credited with naming the church. The name itself carries her fingerprints. They held that first service over at Titus Chapel C.M.E.

Church, then moved to the Odd Fellows Hall, and they started a building fund campaign. By 1906, a small wood frame building was standing on Park Street. A real church.

A real home. And then, June 1913, while pastor William Washington served, it burned. Just like that, gone.

Now what does a congregation do after something like that? They erected a brush arbor on the same lot and kept worshiping. Let that land for a moment.

Same lot. Same people. Still at it.

Under Rev. M.K. Curry, a basement went up first, and then, by 1917, a two-story brick sanctuary was completed.

The first baptistery of any Eastside area church. A four-room house behind the building was bought as the first parsonage. Saint John was becoming something beyond a Sunday morning destination.

It was becoming a center, spiritual and social, for the whole community. Then came the 1930s, and the Great Depression hit Wichita Falls like it hit everywhere else. Hard and without mercy.

Rev. Moses P. Timms and six other ministers of the Eastside Ministerial Alliance used the basement of Saint John to feed approximately two hundred people per day.

Two hundred people, every day, kept going by what that basement could hold and what those ministers were willin' to give. The church kept growing, kept reaching. Rev.

Theodore Smith was influential in building the first Black church-owned recreational community park, complete with a concession stand, in 1947. Then property was purchased at 1009 Flood Street for a new church, dedicated in August 1958. The architect for that building was Rev.

L.D. Bell's son. In 1967, the mortgage was paid off entirely, and a new three-thousand-square-foot parsonage was built.

From a borrowed room at Titus Chapel to a paid-off church with a parsonage and a park, Saint John Baptist Church has been standing and serving for more than a century now, still a vital part of the Eastside community of Wichita Falls. Some stories don't have an ending. This is one of them.

What the marker says

In June 1884, the Grainger & Ballow Addition was platted in an area later called the Eastside, which became the center of the African American community of Wichita Falls. In this neighborhood in November 1905, Rev. W.M. Massey, Charles and Susan Frizzell Craft, Andrew Byrd, William Johnson and Lizzie Scott Richardson organized Saint John Baptist Church, the third congregation of the Black community. Mrs. Richardson is credited for naming the church. The first service was held at Titus Chapel C.M.E. Church. The church soon moved to the Odd Fellows Hall and a building fund campaign was initiated. A small wood frame building was erected on Park Street in 1906, but unfortunately burned in June 1913 while pastor William Washington served. A brush arbor, used for worship, was erected on the same lot. Under Rev. M.K. Curry, a basement was built and by 1917 a two-story brick sanctuary was completed with the first baptistery of the Eastside area churches. A four-room house behind the church was bought as the first parsonage. Saint John became a spiritual and social center for the community. During the devastating Great Depression of the 1930s, Rev. Moses P. Timms and six other ministers of the Eastside Ministerial Alliance sponsored the feeding of approximately two hundred people per day with meals served in the basement of Saint John. Rev. Theodore Smith was influential in building the first Black church-owned recreational community park with a concession stand in 1947. Property was purchased at 1009 Flood Street to erect a new church, dedicated in August 1958. Rev. L.D. Bell's son was the architect. In 1967, the church mortgage was paid off and a new three thousand-square-foot parsonage was built. Saint John Baptist Church, more than a century old, still remains a vital part of the Eastside community of Wichita Falls. (2019)