Church History
A History of Revolution / Northside Baptist Church
1907 – 2009
Dedication
Revolution / Northside Baptist Church has been blessed over these past seventy-five years with dedicated men who were called to serve as our pastor. This history is respectfully dedicated to the women who stood beside these men as their helpmates-to the wives of our pastors, past, present and future, who have faithfully served their Savior and this church
PREFACE
“Look unto the rock whence ye are hewn.” Isaiah 51:1
This history originated from the casual conversation of a Pulpit Committee traveling to hear a prospective pastor. The younger members of the Committee, although we had been in Revolution Baptist Church all our lives, were eager to hear of the hardships and struggles of the earlier church, particularly the building of the new church building in 1949-50. As the older members began to unwind their stories, the desire for more information grew until an official History Committee was elected by the church to research and write the history of Revolution and Northside Baptist Church. It is fitting and proper that this History be presented to the church in its finished form on its Seventy-Fifth Anniversary.
As your History Committee set forth to search out and write the history of our church, we soon discovered it would not be an easy task. There were very few records dating back into the early 1900’s. There were no charter members alive to be interviewed. However, thank God for the insight of a few people. There were two earlier histories. One written in 1930 by the pastor W. O. Johnson and the other undated and unsigned, but apparently written between 1938 and 1942 because it speaks of Rev. Starling as the pastor and the raising of funds to build a new church building. We have used these two histories, church minutes, as well as the Piedmont Association records and other sources to put together the facts as accurately as incomplete records and human memory allowed.
It would have been wonderful to have interviewed Rev. Joe Trogdon and any of the charter members. We did, however, have a great deal of cooperation from our present membership. They supplied us with photographs and documents as well as information they remembered hearing from their families and friends. A special thank you to Miss Sallie Burgess, Mrs. Ida Strickland and Mrs. Irene Melton who have provided us with a wealth of information and photographs. Ida’s parents, Mr. & Mrs. Z. C. Newnam were charter members.
This history was written with much love and a concern that the facts be presented accurately. All the while realizing there is much more than facts and figures that go into the building and nurturing of a church. A church is not founded without dedication and love for our Saviour and Lord. It does not grow and endure without that same spirit of devotion handed down through the generations. Our love for our Saviour and our devotion to His Church has grown and indeed multiplied in the months we have researched and finally put down on paper the information that makes up this history.
We have been humbled by the faithfulness and stewardship of these people. No church is ever without controversy. People often disagree over issues, even church people. Yet through these past seventy-five years this church has continued to exist and the spirit of those early Christians meeting to help establish a church were they could worship and serve prevails.
“Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.” Psalms 127:1
A NEW COMMUNITY
The history of Revolution Baptist Church is so closely tied to the Cone Mill Textile Industry that it cannot be told without a brief history of the “Mill Hill” community. The Cone family had come south to build their cotton industry, and the promise of jobs in these mills brought many people from farms and small villages across North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia to the growing city of Greensboro. A new mill located on Ninth Street introduced a “revolutionary” new method of producing cotton fabric and was appropriately called Revolution Cotton Mill. The Cone Company surrounded the mill with houses for their employees to rent at reduced rates. They built community schools and a “company” store where goods were offered, often at reduced prices.
The Cone Company built the same facilities around each of its mills including White Oak and Proximity. Each community was named for the mill that employed its residents.
There were virtually no cars available in the early part of the century. People had to walk everywhere they went; to work, to school, shopping, to church. These people soon developed strong community identification and loyalty.
THE INFANT CHURCH
In the early months of the yar 1907, a group of dedicated Baptists began meeting in a house at #36 Peach Street in Revolution for Sunday morning Bible study. The nearest Baptist Church at that time was Proximity Baptist (now Eller Memorial), which was established in 1897 as a mission of the First Baptist Church of Greensboro. The partitions were removed from the rooms of the house to accommodate these faithful Christians as a seed was planted that would grow in just a few short months to blossom into a new church. These men and women saw a need for a Southern Baptist Church in their community. You can see the spot where this original group began meeting for Sunday School just by standing on the front porch of the present church building, 1100 East Cornwallis drive, and looking over the housetops on Cypress Street toward the railroad.
The new Revolution Baptist Church along with Pomona and White Oak (now Sixteenth Street) was examined and accepted by the Piedmont Baptist Association in 1907 at a meeting at Asheboro Street Baptist church. These three churches were only the eight, ninth, and tenth churches to become a part of the association. Revolution was one of the few churches of the association that was not started as a mission of the First Baptist Church.
The work was fostered by Rev. H. T. Stevens under the supervision of the associational general missionary, Rev. W. H. Eller. Rev. J. M. Trogdon was appointed by the association as the church’s first pastor. In June 1907, his first sermon was preached in the “old Revolution school house” (located on Cypress Street where the current church parking lot stands). There is some discrepancy in the records at this point. A previous history lists only twelve charter members but an earlier history states, “Brother Trogdon says that he remembers there were eleven charter members though we have listed fourteen who were so closely associated with the beginning of the church that they are believed to be charter members. . . “
These fourteen members are as follows:
Rev. and Mrs. J. M. Trogdon
Mr. and Mrs. Barker
Mr. A. S. Cates
Sister Amanda Jones
Mr. and Mrs. N. B. Manly
Mr. and Mrs. Z. C. Newnam
Mrs. Kate Redwine
Mrs. G. P. Stone
Mr. Jack Thompson
Mrs. T. O. Ward
Brother A. S. Cates served as the first clerk and treasurer.
The new church and its pastor set about immediately to erect a building on a lot donated by the Cone family. Rev. Trogdon drew the plans and erected most of that first structure himself. God blessed the Church from the very beginning. Seven people were baptized that first year.
The newly acquired church property was located at the northeast corner of Hubbard Street and what is now Cornwallis Drive. Again, you can stand on the porch of the present building and look across Cornwallis and up the hill to that 1907 spot.
The first pastor’s salary in the year 1907 was only three hundred dollars, half of which was paid by the Home Mission Board. Rev. Trogdon left the church in 1908 to return to the seminary. Rev. K. C. Horner succeeded him. When asked about his roll in establishing this new church, Rev. Trogdon is quoted in an earlier history written by Rev. W. O. Johnson in 1930 as saying, “Brother W. H. Eller (general missionary for the Piedmont Association) was of great service in every way to us while I was pastor at Revolution, and without his services we would likely have accomplished very little. The church owes ten times more to him than they do to me.”
