St. Paul’s Epistle

THE OFFICIAL NEWSLETTER OF ST. PAUL’S EPISCOPAL CHURCH

March 2022, VOLUME 44

EASTER DECORATING 

The Altar Guild and Fr. Jim had already decided to scale back on the amount of Easter lilies we wanted to use for our Easter celebrations and now we’ve been told that lilies aren’t available this year through the florists. We will still have beautiful arrangements of flowers in urns on the altar, and if we can find them, a few lilies around the altar. We will have the decorated pew torches and would like to have some kind of window decorations. Creative input would be appreciated.

Also, we will bring out the large wooden cross for the 10:30 service on Easter Sunday for the children to fill it with fresh flowers during the service. Adults will have to help the kids out and bring small bouquets to fill in the shelves in the cross. Jo C-K

Churchman’s Club

Editor’s Note: For many years, on the property just west of St. Paul’s on Main Street, the church used a small building for church and civic functions. As I recall the building was of frame construction, with a small porch on the front. I remember going to Shrove Tuesday Pancake suppers there, and the chili suppers were excellent also. St. Paul’s has always been blessed with many good cooks – both women and men. Here are excerpts from ‘Worthy of Much Praise’ regarding the origin and use of the Churchman’s Club building which was torn down for the construction of the new parish hall and kitchen in 1952:

In March of 1909, Senor Warden J. C. Fitzhugh bought the lot described in the vestry minutes as lying ‘just south’ of the church. It contained a small building used at the time as a family grocery store. Fitzhugh held the property until the congregation could raise the total of $1400 he had paid for it. According to the vestry minutes, Bishop Brown offered $500 toward the price, but this was refused until he assured them that the money would not come from the missionary funds. As a personal loan from the bishop himself it was acceptable.

The next mention of this small store building in vestry minutes, in June of 1910, noted that it was being rented by a Mr. Clayt Baker for $15 a month. It is not clear, but it seems likely that this property is the room marked “Grocery” in the little complex shown on the 1901 map. An additional strip of property on Main Street was later acquired in September 1918. This was the lot containing what had once been Kate Hooper’s millinery shop. A small building was attached to the store and identified as a dwelling in the 1908 Sanborn map. This little house, with some modifications, later became known as the “Churchman’s Club” and was used for many years as a sort of parish hall.

After the arrival of the Rev. J. H. Boosey on October 1, 1925, the young people changed their place of meeting from the undercroft to the Churchman’s Club and average attendance grew from ten to twenty. Additional projects mentioned were a League orchestra, which played at a fall social; and a Missionary Tea and Sale, held on December 4 that year.

Besides the wonderful burst of enthusiastic work by the young people of St. Paul’s, another report for the year 1924, published in the Arkansas Churchman, mentioned the projects of the Churchman’s Club, the young men of the parish – work at the Ruddell Mission, a monthly community sing in a local theater, a men’s Bible class, and the installation on the church lawn of a glass-enclosed bulletin board.

The women were busy, too. St. Paul’s Guild, with over forty names on the roll in the mid-1920’s, met weekly, except during the hot summer months. Mrs. Charles Mosby (note: Mosby’s Jewelry store further down on Main and the Mosby home still remains on the corner of River and Bates Streets) was president in January of 1924 when the group voted to turn over to “the younger men’s club of the church” the house formerly controlled by the Guild. The ladies did, however, continue to use the “Churchman’s Club” facilities to give luncheons and banquets for such groups as the Chamber of Commerce and the Philomathean Society of Arkansas College.

The meals prepared by the women in the Churchman’s Club were managed under the most primitive conditions. It was not until December of 1925 that Mrs. Ramsey Weaver paid to have a sink installed in the small kitchen there, and that November the ladies voted to buy a new Perfection oil stove for the kitchen of the rectory since “carrying the oil stove from the rectory to the Churchman’s Club every Monday and for banquets was very inconvenient for Mrs. Boosey.”

The meals were not light snacks. At the 1925 Christmas Sale the menu for the 75 cent dinner was turkey and dressing, creamed potatoes and peas, cranberries and fruit salad, celery, hot rolls, coffee and pumpkin and mincemeat pies.

At a vestry meeting in January, 1952, contractor presented plans for a proposed parish house. The plans were approved, along with estimated expenses of $3,200 for wiring, heating and plumbing, and $7,500 for the Sunday School rooms to be located adjacent to the hall. The Women’s Auxiliary pledged to finance equipment for the new kitchen in the hall.

Mr. Jones, the contractor, was given permission to tear down the historic little Churchman’s Club, with instructions to save anything in the way of reusable materials for the new hall.

CELEBRATING BIRTHDAYS & ANNIVERSARIES

Birthdays: Cindy Allen (4/2), Lloyd Bess (4/5), Virginia Cruse (4/6), Danny Dozier (4/10) John Dempsey (4/11), Dwight Ford (4/13), Billy Estes (4/13), Colten McSpadden (4/13), Wemolet Margolis (4/13), Samuel Sullins (4/14), Mary Guenzel (4/15), Carter Ford (4/16), Cameron Gillespie (4/17), Byron Skinner (4/18), Dean Sullins (4/20), Arch Jones (4/22), Judy Purnell (4/23), Royce Haigwood (4/27), Betsy Bumpers (4/27), & Ray Sullins (4/30).

Anniversaries: Sarah Hays & Rick VanGrouw (4/11), Kera & Alisha Cook (4/15), Jim & Kay Longenbach (4/20), and Jessica & Grant Goodwin (4/26).

If you have a birthday or anniversary you would like added to our list, please contact the office at s[email protected]