History
The church was established in 1883 with eight charter members, including its first minister, Arthur Burnell. The vacant Presbyterian Mission was purchased with the help of the American Home Mission board to house the new church. The name "Oberlin" was chosen in honor of Oberlin College, where Burnell and his wife had attended college.
In 1902 the members of the church voted to build a new church building. Their new two-story wood-frame building, with a steeple, incorporated lumber from the old church, which had been dismantled. Timbers from the 1854 Methodist Episcopal Church building may also have been used. Members of the First Congregational Church in Tacoma are reported to have traveled by electric streetcar from Tacoma to participate in its dedication. The 1902 church building now houses the Steilacoom Cultural Center and Tribal Museum.
The church had about 28 ministers over its first 125 years of operation, from 1883 to 2008. For many years one minister served Oberlin Congregational Church as well as congregations in the nearby communities of Lakeview and Lake City. In 1915 the church asked the Home Missionary Society for a loan of $144 to buy Reverend Charles Gaffney a motorcycle for traveling between Steilacoom and the other churches he served. The first full-time minister at Oberlin was Herbert West, who served from 1926 to 1951.
For many years, the church Ladies Aid Society kept the church open by conducting fund-raising events to pay its operating expenses.
As the community and the church continued to grow during the 1950s, the decision was made in 1960 to build a new church at the corner of Rainier and Pacific Streets. The first phase was completed in 1961, the second in 1978 with the additions of a Fellowship Hall, Sunday school rooms, offices and kitchen.
Oberlin has a membership of nearly 300 and a paid staff. In April 1983, Oberlin Congregational Church celebrated its centennial year. In 2002, the church participated in the Washington State sesquicentennial celebration as Steilacoom's oldest "pioneer" corporation. The 125th anniversary celebration of the founding of the church was observed in April 2008, with a special prayer service and potluck dinner.
Read more about this topic: Oberlin Congregational Church
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“No one can understand Paris and its history who does not understand that its fierceness is the balance and justification of its frivolity. It is called a city of pleasure; but it may also very specially be called a city of pain. The crown of roses is also a crown of thorns. Its people are too prone to hurt others, but quite ready also to hurt themselves. They are martyrs for religion, they are martyrs for irreligion; they are even martyrs for immorality.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“There is a history in all men’s lives,
Figuring the natures of the times deceased,
The which observed, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Throughout the history of commercial life nobody has ever quite liked the commission man. His function is too vague, his presence always seems one too many, his profit looks too easy, and even when you admit that he has a necessary function, you feel that this function is, as it were, a personification of something that in an ethical society would not need to exist. If people could deal with one another honestly, they would not need agents.”
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)