Dalton First United Methodist Church: Children’s ministry large part of church

Submitted by Dalton First United Methodist Church

Editor’s note: Third in a series of articles about the history of Dalton First United Methodist Church. The final article in the series will appear in Sunday’s paper.

On Nov. 16, 1975, the Dalton Daily Citizen News headlines read “Methodist Educational Building to Be Formally Dedicated in Service Sunday.” Dalton native Bishop William R. Cannon officiated. Reynolds Greene Jr. was pastor.

The people called Methodists have always placed an emphasis on religious and biblical instruction. Sunday schools were first set up in America to provide religious education to working children on their one day off from the factory. The early schools also taught reading, writing and cyphering (arithmetic), as well as the Bible. Following the Civil War, the Sunday school movement was transformed to a world-wide work of Protestant denominations and focused primarily on religious education.

According to Gertrude “Tut” McFarland, “Prior to 1847, a small group of Methodists had been meeting at Clear Springs Academy, just north of Dalton. It was served by the pastor of the Spring Place Mission.” Dalton First United Methodist Church was established in 1847, just a few years after the Cherokee Indians had been forced to leave their homeland and move West. The congregation moved to a small log schoolhouse located about where Dalton Green is today.

Most of the land in the area had been bought by the New England Land Co., a syndicate headed by Capt. Edward White of Massachusetts. The town named Cross Plains was in the county of Murray. The name was changed to Dalton in 1848 and the newly created county of Whitfield established in 1851. White had donated a lot to the Methodists at the corner of Cleveland (now Selvidge Street) and King Street and with $500 a small wooden church was built. Initially, Baptists, Methodists and Presbyterians all began worshiping in the neat frame church built by White.

According to the Dalton First United Methodist Church history compiled by Ellis Owen and published in 1986: “Proof that the early years of the last century were indeed good years is found in the pages of the Dalton Argus and the North Georgia Citizen ... Growth in membership caused numerous building programs.” In 1887 a brick structure replaced the wooden building. In 1907 a Sunday school addition was added. The primary need in the early 1900s was for repairs to the church and “enlargement to accommodate the rapidly growing Sunday school.”

A handsome new addition was dedicated and within weeks the Argus was reporting that the Methodists needed “to add a new Primary building on the north side of the church because of the rapidly growing Sunday school ... The new addition was filled to overflowing.” By the early ‘50s, the Sunday school program was averaging 500 people in attendance!

In a few weeks there will be a dedication of still another “addition” to the Sunday school program. As First Methodist strives to continue its strong Sunday school heritage, a brand new “center” will be opened. When a new director of Children's Ministry, Jan (Mrs. Paul) Byrum, began long-range planning five years ago, her goal, in her words, “was the need to have a 21st century Sunday school for 21st century children.” Under her leadership for the past five years the children “have gotten to experience Sunday school in a way that speaks to them and in a different way each week. Average attendance has increased more than 40 percent.”

In looking to the future, the church will dedicate a new Children’s Worship Room in response to ideas which came from the children themselves. They were asked to come up with a theme from the Bible that would be meaningful to them and Noah’s Ark was the result. But as Director Jan expressed it, “We looked for a different way. There will be no ark sitting up on a hill with a rainbow overhead. Instead the children will feel like they are actually sitting inside the ark with all its animals.”

The success of these programs shows in a reflection of Christ in each child’s face.

Renowned Mount Juliet, Tenn., artist and sculptor Keith Tucker is coming to dedicate his creation. He has worked for theater groups and libraries, and has done the backdrops for various country music artists.

Women have had a leadership role in the Methodist Church from its earliest days when founder John Wesley officially authorized a woman to preach, but it was not until 1956 that Methodists granted full clergy rights to women. The first time a woman was elected to be a bishop was in 1980. Women in Dalton FUMC have always held leadership positions and made significant contributions to many of the church’s programs, both altruistically and internally.

When the church decided it needed to build a new parsonage for its minister and family, the Ladies of the Church helped raise money through selling ice cream and cold drinks at an auction, holding banquets and oyster suppers, and in many other ways. The parsonage built in 1924 was home to Davies Jewelers for many years, and today houses Unique Selections.

Women in the Wesleyan Service Guild raised the money in 1948 to purchase a set of chimes for the church. In May 1954, 23 children participated in the first graduation of a new weekday kindergarten led by Clyde Ellen (Mrs. L.B.) Hubbs and Maryann (Mrs. Frank) Broadrick. It quickly became highly regarded as an excellent program and has served as many as 188 children at the same time. Led by Lynda (Mrs. Gary) Johnson, this kindergarten and pre-school program continues today and is in high demand. In 1956, under the leadership of Ann (Mrs. R.E.) Hamilton, a church library was opened.

One of the most significant contributions made by ladies of the church was the formation of Friendship House in what was known as the “Happy Top” area of Dalton. In 1957, Mrs. Viola Strozier, the visiting teacher for the Dalton schools, called on a family living “within the shadow of the cross above First Baptist Church,” as one young minister in that church related.

As described in the official church history: “A mother with a newborn baby and eight other children were living in a shack without indoor plumbing; without an outside privy also. The floor was clay; the one water tap (outside) had been turned off by the city for non-payment of the water bill. They had no food, no coal, no diapers, blankets or clothing for the new baby. The only two pieces of furniture for the 11 people in the family were one bed and one sofa.”

Mrs. Strozier’s daughter, Jane (Mrs. Pleas) Smith, became a one-woman missionary to relieve the suffering of this family, and eventually, the whole neighborhood. Her first attempts failed. While she was still in shock that human beings lived in degradation worse than any horse, or cow, or chicken in Whitfield County, she went to members of her church and to the president of the Church Women United. All four downtown churches were galvanized into action: First Presbyterian, First Baptist, First Methodist and St. Mark's Episcopal. Women's groups took action. In August, the Cannon Sunday school class voted to sponsor a kindergarten. The four churches responded with financial support.

And from the church history, this account: “Margaret (Mrs. W.K.) Newman single-handedly took responsibility for spending these funds to cover all the needs. Many of the women who were there still giggle that she even sold a rusty furnace that didn’t work! She performed a miracle and had the building ready for use as a neighborhood center and kindergarten by September 1958, when Friendship House opened its doors to the neighborhood with a watermelon cutting party. Women and children came, but no men attended.”

Programs grew and flourished until by 1961 the budget was stretched almost to the breaking point. First Methodist Church took total responsibility for the kindergarten and the First Baptist ladies led by Mary B. Longley developed a Mothers’ Club that taught the mothers of the kindergarten children to sew, cook, enhanced personal grooming and personal relationship skills. The Rev. Frank Allen of St. Mark’s Episcopal did all the recreation for the school-age children himself. And the women of First Presbyterian ran a church school on Sunday mornings.

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Dalton First United Methodist Church: Children’s ministry large part of church

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