One of the most well-known black churches in the Wissahickon Valley Region was the Bethlehem Baptist Church located in Penllyn.
What kept the black community together at the Bethlehem Baptist Church? How did it get started? How much impact does it have on the black community?
Its Humble Beginnings
It all began in 1885 when the Fillman couple organized 19 members at their home to congregate. When the congregation grew, the group decided to lease, and later purchase, a frame building built by George Amberg.
In 1891, Westmoreland, VA native, Reverend Caesar A. Edwards (1866-1934), became the church's first pastor, and remained with the church for 43 years. According to Penllyn resident Gloria Stewart Jones, not every member of the church was from Penllyn. The church created a connection to the people that brings them together.
In 1906, there was a discussion to build a new church. Reverend Edwards, Nelson Stewart, George Taylor, and other members worked together to quarry stones from local residents to build their church. On October 17, 1906, the Bethlehem Baptist Church was dedicated. The church used the Wissahickon Creek to baptize new converts. Unfortunately, five days after the new church was built, a fire broke out.
Good news came to the church when the Mount Pleasant Baptist church sold its Penllyn mission to the Bethlehem Baptist Church. In 1908, John B. Martin (1850-1914) was awarded the contract to erect the new church with the old structure added. On December 7, 1908, the church was officially chartered by the Court of Common Pleas of Montgomery County.
Fun Fact #1: George Taylor was responsible for moving the stones to incorporate it into the newly built church.
Fun Fact #2: Reverend Edwards made a tribute to John B. Martin when he passed away.
In the early 2000s, the church purchased an additional building from the Congregation Beth Or on Penllyn Pike.
Caesar A. Edwards and The Memorial Park
The Bethlehem Baptist Church was Caesar's first and only church he preached for 43 years. He was born in Westmorland County, VA, and was educated for the ministry in Washington, D.C. He received his Doctorate of Divinity in 1916.
He married fellow Virginian Nellie Young of Spotsylvania County, and had one son named Harvey and two daughters: Virginia, Nellie, and Bertha. He had a brother, Alfred, living in Virginia and a sister, Malinda, in Baltimore, Maryland. His house still stands in Penllyn on Trewellyn Avenue.
Fun Fact #3: His daughters Bertha and Nellie opened a beauty salon at their father's former home in the 1930s. It was named "Edwards Beauty Salon." In a 1991 interview, Nellie stated that she wanted to be a teacher, but when Caesar died, Nellie had to come home. That was when she and her sister Bertha decided to open a beauty salon. The beauty salon closed after Bertha died.
Outside of the church, he was involved in the community. He was elected a member of the Lower Gwynedd School Board and president of the Ministers' Conference in Philadelphia.
Under Caesar's leadership, more than 400 people became members of the Bethlehem Baptist Church. He married over 700 people and conducted 1,100 funerals not only in Penllyn, but also in other places including Virginia.
In 1939, five years after Rev. Caesar Edwards died, the people of Penllyn dedicated a park in his honor for his contributions to the community. Montgomery County judge Harold G. Knight (1880-1965) purchased the playground to provide the black children a place to play on.
Fun Fact #4: Hon. Harold G. Knight had a close friendship with Reverend Caesar Edwards. Reverend W. Harold Anderson described their friendship like this:
"Character has no color line, and the two great Americans of [Penllyn] community stand side by side as extollers of the belief, 'We are all Americans.'"
The park was located along a "small brook near the waters of the Wissahickon Creek at the northernly end of Trewellyn avenue." Sponsoring this park were the Penllyn Community Committee and the Twentieth Century Club of Penllyn. His family attended the opening of the Caesar A. Edwards Memorial Park.
"Work is the discharge of responsibility, and Play, for which we sacrifice our efforts to provide is the outline of the poisons of stored up energy that affects our systems and warps our minds unless means are provided to expel them through amusement and exercise. Such provision is made through the establishment of this park to keep the youth and the grown alike free of the poisons that become latent factors in ourselves and urge our instincts to wrong doing."
- Reverend W. Harold Anderson (1939)
NOTE: The location of the memorial park was not where the Penllyn Woods is currently located. It was located where the former Penllyn school was on the corner of Trewellyn and Gwynedd Avenues.
Bibliography
"BBC History." Bethlehem Baptist Church. Accessed August 18, 2021. https://bbc4christ.org/about-bbc/bbc-history/.
"Blast Damages Negro Church." The Bee. February 19, 1964. Page 21. https://www.newspapers.com/clip/14996792/rev-silas-b-holmes-weighs-in-on-church/.
"Dedicate Park In Penllyn For Negro Recreation Center." Ambler Gazette. June 29, 1939. Page 1 & 7. http://digitalcollections.powerlibrary.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/wivp-gazett/id/21325/rec/1.
“Google Maps Area Calculator Tool." DaftLogic. Accessed December 29, 2021. https://www.daftlogic.com/projects-google-maps-area-calculator-tool.htm.
Jones, E. Gloria Stewart. Penllyn Village: Lest We Forget: A History and Personal Memories of a Black Settlement in Lower Gwynedd Township in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. (2008): 49-50, 83-89, 93.
Mueller, A. H. Atlas of the North Penn Section of Montgomery County, Pa., Plate 29, 1916.
Philadelphia Real Estate Record and Builders' Guide, v. 3, n. 2 (1888): 405.
"Rev. C. A. Edwards Laid To His Rest." Ambler Gazette. January 25, 1934. Page 6. http://digitalcollections.powerlibrary.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/wivp-gazett/id/18430/rec/1.
"Wissahickon Valley Public Library's Ambler Gazette Collection." POWER Library: Pennsylvania's Electronic Library. Accessed August 18, 2021. http://digitalcollections.powerlibrary.org/cdm/landingpage/collection/wivp-gazett.