Little Jerusalem AME Church

Last updated
Little Jerusalem AME Church
BensalemPA JerusalemAMEChurch.jpg
Little Jerusalem AME Church, April 2012
USA Pennsylvania location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Usa edcp location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Location1200 Bridgewater Rd., Cornwells Heights, Pennsylvania
Coordinates 40°05′57″N74°55′25″W / 40.09917°N 74.92361°W / 40.09917; -74.92361
Area0.5 acres (0.20 ha)
Built1830
NRHP reference No. 80003429 [1]
Added to NRHPDecember 03, 1980

Little Jerusalem AME Church, also known as Bensalem AME Church, is a historic African Methodist Episcopal church located at 1200 Bridgewater Road in Cornwells Heights, Bensalem Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. It was built in 1830 and renovated about 1860 and 1896. It is a 1+12-story, one-room frame structure with a gable roof. The cemetery surrounding the church contains burials of black Civil War soldiers. [2]

It is one of the oldest African American churches, having been established about 1820 by Rev. James Miller under the supervision of Richard Allen (1760–1831), founder of the AME Church. [3] The pulpit of the church was built by Allen. The church served as a shelter in the Underground Railroad, helping those fleeing slavery. [4] It was the only traditionally African-American church in Bensalem Township from 1830 until 1930. Under the pastorate of Reverend John Butler, a sabbath school was established in 1848 to teach local African Americans to read and write. [2]

The site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980. [1]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania</span> Township in Pennsylvania, United States

Bensalem Township is a township in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States. The township borders the northeastern section of Philadelphia and includes the communities of Andalusia, Bensalem, Bridgewater, Cornwells Heights, Eddington, Flushing, Oakford, Siles, Trappe, and Trevose. Bensalem Township has no other incorporated municipalities within its boundaries. It is located within the Delaware Valley, also known as the Philadelphia metropolitan area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Buckingham Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania</span> Township in Pennsylvania, United States

Buckingham Township is a township in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 20,075 at the 2010 census. Buckingham takes its name from Buckingham in Buckinghamshire, England. Buckingham Township was once known as Greenville and was once the historic county seat of the English Bucks County.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Allen (bishop)</span> American educator, author, writer, and black leader (1760–1831)

Richard Allen was a minister, educator, writer, and one of the United States' most active and influential black leaders. In 1794, he founded the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), the first independent Black denomination in the United States. He opened his first AME church in 1794 in Philadelphia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church</span> Historic church in Pennsylvania, United States

The Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church is an historic church and congregation which is located at 419 South 6th Street in Center City Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. The congregation, founded in 1794, is the oldest African Methodist Episcopal congregation in the nation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Buckingham Mountain</span>

Buckingham Mountain is located in Buckingham Township in Central Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is the second most elevated land in all of Bucks County at 520 feet.

Black Methodism in the United States is the Methodist tradition within the Black Church, largely consisting of congregations in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME), African Methodist Episcopal Zion, Christian Methodist Episcopal denominations, as well as those African American congregations in other Methodist denominations, such as the Free Methodist Church.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">St. Paul A.M.E. Church (Raleigh, North Carolina)</span> Historic church in North Carolina, United States

The St. Paul A.M.E. Church is a historic American Gothic Revival style African Methodist Episcopal Church located in Raleigh, North Carolina. A red brick and frame structure built in 1884 by black masons, St. Paul's was the first independent congregation of African Americans in Raleigh and is the oldest African-American church in Wake County, North Carolina. Before the end of the Civil War, the future founders of St. Paul's had been slave members of the Edenton Street United Methodist Church. The members of the church began calling their congregation "St. Paul's" in 1848. The church was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in November 1987 and is also a Raleigh Historic Landmark.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church and Parsonage</span> Historic church in Massachusetts, United States

The Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church and Parsonage is an historic church and parsonage at 6 Sever Street in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The congregation, founded in 1866, is one of a small number of African Methodist Episcopal (AME) congregations in eastern Massachusetts, and is an enduring component of the small African-American community in Plymouth. Its church, built about 1840 as a commercial building and consecrated in 1870, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">St. David's Episcopal Church (Radnor, Pennsylvania)</span> Historic church in Pennsylvania, United States

St. David's Episcopal Church, also known as St. David's at Radnor or Old St. David's, is a parish of the Episcopal Church located at 763 South Valley Forge Road in Radnor Township, Pennsylvania. The church property contains the original church built in 1715, a chapel, church offices, school and cemetery. The property straddles the borders of Radnor Township and Newtown Township in Delaware County and the majority of the cemetery is in Easttown Township, Chester County. It was founded c. 1700 in the Welsh Tract section of the Province of Pennsylvania by Welsh settlers and has grown to be the largest congregation in the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania with approximately 3,000 members. The original church and cemetery were placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bethel AME Church (Reading, Pennsylvania)</span> Historic church in Pennsylvania, United States

Bethel AME Church, now known as the Central Pennsylvania African American Museum, is a historic African Methodist Episcopal church at 119 North 10th Street in Reading, Berks County, Pennsylvania. It was originally built in 1837, and is a 2½-storey brick and stucco building with a gable roof. It was rebuilt about 1867–1869, and remodeled in 1889. It features a three-storey brick tower with a pyramidal roof topped by a finial. The church is known to have housed fugitive slaves and the congregation was active in the Underground Railroad. The church is now home to a museum dedicated to the history of African Americans in Central Pennsylvania.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church (Springtown, New Jersey)</span> Historic church in New Jersey, United States

Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church is a historic African Methodist Episcopal Church in Springtown, New Jersey, United States. The church was part of two free negro communities, Othello and Springtown, established by local Quaker families, like the Van Leer Family. The congregation was established in 1810 in Greenwich Township as the African Methodist Society and joined the African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1817. A previous church building was burned down in the 1830s in an arson incident and the current structure was built between 1838 and 1841.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church and Mount Zion Cemetery</span> Historic church in New Jersey, United States

Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church and Mount Zion Cemetery is a historic church and cemetery located at 172 Garwin Road in Woolwich Township, New Jersey, United States. The church was a stop on the Greenwich Line of the Underground Railroad through South Jersey operated by Harriet Tubman for 10 years. The church provided supplies and shelter to runaway slaves on their way to Canada from the South. The church and cemetery were part of the early 19th-century free negro settlement sponsored by Quakers known as Small Gloucester.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Star Hill AME Church</span> Historic church in Delaware, United States

Star Hill AME Church, also known as Star of the East Church, is a historic African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church building and cemetery located in Dover, Delaware near Camden, Kent County, Delaware. It was constructed about 1866, and is a one-story, three-bay by three-bay, gable roofed, frame building in a vernacular Gothic Revival-style. It features a small bell tower at the roof ridge. Interments in the adjacent cemetery are believed to begin with the founding of the church in the 1860s, but the earliest marked grave dates from the early 1890s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church</span> Historic church in Delaware, United States

Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church is a historic African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church and cemetery located at Camden, Kent County, Delaware. It was originally built in 1845 and re-built after a fire in 1889. The one-story, gable roofed frame Classical Revival-style church rests on a brick foundation. It measures 28 feet, 3 inches, wide and 36 feet, 2 inches in length. The ground around the church has been used as a cemetery since the church was established. The church is an important focal point of the community of Star Hill, an early community of African American settlement in Kent County. Zion was the first African Methodist Episcopal church in Camden, and is the mother church of nearby Star Hill AME Church.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tindley Temple United Methodist Church</span> Historic church in Pennsylvania, United States

Tindley Temple United Methodist Church, also known as Tindley Temple Methodist Episcopal Church and Calvary United Methodist Church, is a historic Methodist Episcopal church located in the Southwest Center City neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was built between 1923 and 1928, and is a large masonry building influenced by the Beaux-Arts Romanesque and Art Deco styles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Allen Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church (Lincoln, Illinois)</span> Historic church in Illinois, United States

Allen Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church is an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church located at 902 Broadway in Lincoln, Illinois. As a black church, Allen Chapel served as a center of Lincoln's small African-American community. The church hosted the community's religious and social events. As an AME church, it provided AME publications to and helped educate its members. As Lincoln was both segregated and predominantly white for much of the church's early history, the church played an important role as one of the few organizations dedicated to improving the lives of the city's black residents. The church is still used for religious services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum</span> United States historic place

The Stoutsburg Sourland African American Museum (SSAAM) is a history museum located in the Skillman section of Montgomery Township, New Jersey, United States. The museum is located at the Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church, an African Methodist Episcopal church constructed in 1899. The church was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 7, 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Zion A.M.E. Church (Tredyffrin Township, Pennsylvania)</span> United States historic place

Mount Zion A.M.E. Church is a historic African American church in Tredyffrin Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania. Built in 1880 and expanded in 1906, Mount Zion was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 27, 2015. It was an important community gathering place for African Americans battling racial segregation of local schools in the 1930s.

References

  1. 1 2 "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service. March 13, 2009.
  2. 1 2 Savage, Beth L. (1994). African American Historic Places. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. pp. 409–410. ISBN   0-471-14345-6 . Retrieved 8 May 2020.
  3. "National Historic Landmarks & National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania". CRGIS: Cultural Resources Geographic Information System. Archived from the original (Searchable database) on 2007-07-21. Retrieved 2012-10-29.Note: This includes Rev. Jeane B. Williams (n.d.). "National Register of Historic Places Inventory Nomination Form: Little Jerusalem AME Church" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-10-29.
  4. Quann, Peg. "Bensalem AME Church to honor founder Richard Allen". www.buckscountycouriertimes.com. Bucks County Courier Times. Retrieved 8 May 2020.