A Journey of Faith: A History of First United Methodist Church, Alexander City, Alabama

A Journey of Faith: A History ofFirst United Methodist Church, Alexander City, Alabama. By Edith Blankenship, Charles Farrow, Charles Gattis, Ann Neighbors, Bob Saxon, Elna Wolsoncroft, and Sam Wyckoff. Alexander City: First United Methodist Church, 1995. 176 pp. $40.00.

Local church histories often do not merit a full review in scholarly journals, but this one is certainly the exception. It is attractively printed and bound and full of illustrations that bring the text to life, but this work's most commendable feature is the authors' placing the church in its historical setting. They include a brief history of Methodism in Alabama and a much more detailed history of early Alexander City (originally called Youngsville, after the post office established in 1836). The reader quickly recognizes that the church grew with the community and that its members were town leaders. All too frequently church histories, however well written, develop the institution in a cultural vacuum, leaving the reader to wonder what, if anything, else -was happening in the community.

After the land that became Alexander City was ceded by the Creek Treaty of 1832, settlers poured into Tallapoosa County. Church services were provided on a sporadic basis by Methodist, Baptist, Primitive Baptist, and Presbyterian preachers. Methodists organized churches within a radius of ten miles around Youngsville, but it was riot until after the Civil War that the immediate population was large enough to incorporate as a town and to support a church. In January 1872 residents secured a charter organizing the town of Youngsville, renamed Alexander City a year later. In August 1872 the First Methodist Church grew out of a brush arbor revival service, which also led to the formation of the local Baptist church.

The first pastor was W. I Patillo, born in what is now Lee County, Alabama, in 1840. He served from 1872 to 1876. The authors provide a brief biographical sketch of Patillo and each subsequent pastor. A photograph of Patillo accompanies his biography, and illustrations of most of his successors are included as well. Because of the Methodist practice of moving pastors around the conference, most pastors stayed only one or two years. For example, nineteen men served during the first thirty-nine years of the church's existence (1872-1911), an average of slightly over two years. Surprisingly, photographs were available for all but four of these men.

The importance of Alexander City First Methodist. to Methodism in Alabama is clear from the subsequent careers of some of the men who served there. George R. Lynch (pastor from 1876 to 1877 and 1879 to 1881) went on to become business manager of The Alabama Christian Advocate, the state Methodist paper, and pastor of Birmingham's First Methodist Church. James Henry McCoy (1891-93) served as editor of The Advocate and was elected bishop in 1910. Hiram Glass Davis (189496) later became president of church colleges in Athens and Anniston. At least one pastor of the church served as a Civil War chaplain, and another was chaplain of the Alabama_prison system.

Much of the text is filled with names of members and leaders of organizations. Music is treated in a separate chapter. An index enhances the book's value. Except for some minor typographical errors, this book is a model for church histories.

LEE N. ALLEN Samford University

Copyright University of Alabama Press Jan 2000
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