Rebuilding Old Bethel

Just outside Jackson wild turkeys and deer live in woods that take a visitor back to more rustic times. Nearby is an ancient cemetery, and next to the cemetery is a log cabin.

The cabin is not original, but contains logs that once were part of the first Baptist church ever built in the Louisiana Purchase area in 1806 -- Old Bethel Church.

Volunteers come out every week and work on the log building. About 25 men, mostly retired, have come from Advance, Lesterville, Imperial, McClure and even as far away as Springfield, Mo., to help preserve a memory of the first settlers in an area that had once been mostly Catholic when the French and Spanish controlled it. The church is designed to look like it did 200 years ago.

Like the pioneers who built the first Bethel Church, the volunteers are putting the building up as best they can with what they have.

"We had no pictures of the old building," said Steve Strom, a retired lawyer and project carpenter. "We did have some written descriptions in the congregational minutes. The board voted to build a 24-by-30-foot church building of hewn logs with a fireplace at one end and a rough pulpit at the other."

Pernell Bradshaw filled in gaps between logs of the Old Bethel Church in Jackson on April 6.

The church building is put together using hand-made wooden pegs instead of nails, as the original church was. But unlike the original church, the floor is concrete. It will be covered by a hardwood floor like the original floor, but the concrete will protect the wood from water. Like the original church, there is a stone fireplace -- donated by stonemason David Davidson -- but there will be electricity and heat.

"We need to have modern things like lights," said Melvin Gateley, who has spearheaded the renovation project. "People are not going to be able to use it if we don't have lighting."

Authenticity dictates there will be no indoor plumbing. There will be backless benches made of split logs but only a few just to show what pioneers used. There will also be movable tables and chairs.

"Can you imagine sitting on a bench at a service, a bench without a back?" Strom said. "This after getting up a 5 a.m., feeding the chickens, making breakfast, then riding 10 miles on a mule. You have to hand it to the old pioneers. They built this thing after they did work at home. We're using chain saws and better tools."

For the original building, Strom said, it was most likely the women and children who mixed the mud used to place in between the logs to keep out the cold. The volunteers are now chinking between the logs with builder's foam and brick mortar.

Ed Proffer, right, prepared "mud" mortar as Lyle Jones, left, and Charlie Baldwin, center, placed insulation between logs in the Old Bethel Church in Jackson April 6. They hope to dedicate the restored chapel in July.

Once the building is finished, it will be available for use by church groups, children's activities, picnics and weddings, much the same as the Old McKendree Methodist church in Jackson.

Gateley said the building will be dedicated in a special ceremony in early July. Then it will become available to the public, who can request to use it through a governing board from the Missouri Baptist Convention which owns the building and has funded the project through contributions.

lredeffer@semssourian.com

335-6611, extension 160