Hopkins Chapel has Distinguished History

By HENRY ROBINSON

History reveals that the black man's struggle for equality began many years ago. Hopkins Chapel AME Zion Church in celebrating its 100^th anniversary has had a long history in achieving human rights for the black man.

In1868, during the Reconstruction Period in Asheville, black members of the Central Methodist Church decided to withdraw their membership and establish a place or worship among their own race.

The change was brought about when a black minister named Tillery arrived in Asheville. He asked permission to preach to the black congregation but his request was refused. He was told that in order to preach to black people he would have to establish his own church.

In response, black members could only remember the unkindness suffered at the hands of white members of the church. They no longer could endure having to receive holy communion in the galleries and extreme back pews in which they were seated. They found intolerable the fact that Sunday school lessons were taught to their children by white girls on back pews at the rear of the church or on benches outside the church building. When a black person wanted to join the church he was not allowed to do so until after new white members had been received and returned to their seats.

Thus the coming of Rev. Mr. Tillery gave the black members of Central Church an incentive to leave.

Having reached a decision, they began to formulate plans. They built a church of trees, shrubs, and vines at the foot of Beaucatcher Mountain. Each member of the black congregation was contacted by the strong leaders of the group and instructed to meet the following Sunday in front of Central Methodist Church. This they did.

Towards Beaucatcher Mountains they started, singing as they marched. This was the first "protest" march for human dignity in the City of Asheville. While marching to their church the group sang "We're Marching To Zion" and "Children of The Heavenly King."

The brush arbor proved inadequate for the rainy and cold days which faced the group and with arrival of the Rev. Mr. Hopkins they rented a white pine school house at Clemmons and Pine streets (where the Porter Grocery Store now stands).

The church membership then bought property on Haywood street and Montford avenue. The white residents of the neighborhood objected to this move. Subsequently, a white man by the name of Thomas J. Lenoir, desiring the property, agreed to an exchange for the present site of the Church at College and Pine streets, along with an additional sum of two hundred dollars.

A temporary shack was built on the site and later replaced by a weather-boarded structure. It was named Hopkins Chapel in honor of the first pastor of the new congregation.

In 1907 the group suffered a setback when the little church built by ex-slaves burned. The congregation, with the Rev. Charles S. Finney as its pastor, worshiped at the Young Men's Institute (now the Market Street YMCA) until the basement of the present church was completed.

The church continued in growth in the years that followed. Old-timers recalled that on Sunday morning the 500-seat sanctuary would many times be insufficient for all the worshipers who came.

Hopkins Chapel has produced numerous local and national black leaders, including Floyd McKissick, former national director of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), speaker at the church last Sunday.

The present pastor, the Rev. James David Armstrong, will deliver an address to the Congregation Sunday in observance of "Youth Day."

The youth choir, directed by Mrs. Lyda Hammonds, will present a program of songs. Youth choirs from various churches in Asheville will also participate.