Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church is Maryland鈥檚 mother church of the AME Church. It is one of the foundational churches in the AME Connection. After meeting on Saratoga Street for almost 100 years, Bethel AME moved to 1300 Druid Hill Avenue in 1911.
In April 1815, preachers Daniel Coker, Henry Harden, and Richard Williams led about two hundred members of the Lovely Lane and Strawberry Alley Meeting Houses and the African Church on Sharp Street to separate from the Methodist Episcopal Church. Calling themselves 鈥淭he African Methodist Bethel Society,鈥 the group arranged to occupy the former German Lutheran Church on Fish Street (now Saratoga), and created a rent-to-own agreement with its owner. The brick church was built in 1762 and enlarged in 1785. It had three stories in front and two in the rear, with a pulpit, pews and galleries inside. Bethel Church was founded there on April 23 or June 3, 1815. The African Bethel School operated in the church basement to educate Black children. The school hosted exhibitions to celebrate Bethel鈥檚 milestones, such as its founding anniversary, and demonstrate its students鈥 talents.
Coker and the church trustees registered incorporation papers for the 鈥淎frican Methodist Bethel Church or Society in the City of Baltimore鈥 at the Baltimore court house on April 8, 1816. The next day, six delegates traveled from Baltimore to Philadelphia. The assembled delegations established the African Methodist Episcopal Church and ordained Richard Allen to be its first bishop.
Bethel became the owner of its church building on March 7, 1838. The building, however, required work. The church and its land flooded when Jones Falls did 鈥 hence 鈥淔ish Street鈥 鈥 which caused damage and inconvenience. A flood in June 1838 destroyed Bethel鈥檚 school library, which held a thousand books. In addition, the congregation outgrew the building by the early 1840s. Construction on a new church began in August 1847. The Romanesque style church was consecrated on July 9, 1848.
In 1909, the Baltimore City Council condemned the church in order to widen Saratoga Street. The Bethel congregation had to find a new home and purchased the church formerly used by St. Peter鈥檚 Protestant Episcopal Church at Druid Hill Avenue and Lanvale Street. Built in 1868, the church was in the middle of thriving West Baltimore. The move placed Bethel closer to its congregants 鈥 half of the city鈥檚 Black population lived in the neighborhood by 1904 鈥 and among two other relocated Black churches, Sharp Street Memorial and Union Baptist. The opening services took place on January 8, 1911.
Over its history, Bethel has led action to address causes affecting Black Baltimoreans through mutual support, education, benevolent societies, and organizing. Bethel鈥檚 members assisted people escaping slavery, an effort that took place within a larger network of African Methodists. During the Civil War, Bethel hosted special lectures for the US Colored Troops and held fundraisers to support soldiers and their families. At the start of World War I, the congregation expanded to 1,500 members as a result of Black migration from rural areas into the city. Members were active in the Civil Rights Movement and other political causes, including the denouncement of the Vietnam War. In the 1970s, church members established a women鈥檚 counseling center and supported Black liberation in South Africa. Contemporary lay ministries using Bethel Church as a base have addressed the needs of women, the homeless, senior citizens, pregnant teenagers, and drug and alcohol addicts.
Today, Bethel A.M.E remains a bastion in Baltimore鈥檚 African American community dedicated to community enrichment and spiritual guidance.
]]>Amidst the grand old houses, some vacant and in disrepair, and important civil rights historic sites in Historic Marble Hill in West Baltimore sits the Henry Highland Garnet Neighborhood Park. It is a leafy green space, with flowers, trees, giant urns, winding paths, and park benches. Plaques to a variety of local leaders are spread throughout. The park, in the Baltimore National Heritage Area, is named for militant abolitionist and minister, Henry Highland Garnet. Garnet was born into slavery on Maryland鈥檚 Eastern Shore in 1815. He and his family escaped via the Underground Railroad to New York City when he was 9 years old. Although they escaped to a northern state, slave catchers threatened his family. Garnet spent time working on ships and attended several schools established by abolitionists. He became a Presbyterian minister. In 1840 he helped found the . He was known for his captivating and radical speeches encouraging armed uprisings among the enslaved. During the Civil War he helped recruit Black soldiers for the Union Army, and narrowly escaped a white mob during the . On February 12, 1865 he was the first African American to address the United States House of Representatives, encouraging them to adopt the 13th Amendment with a sermon entitled 鈥.鈥 After the end of the war, he continued to work against slavery in Cuba and Brazil. Although he had first been critical of Liberia, a colony in Africa for Black Americans, toward the end of his life he supported Black emigration.聽 In December 1881 President James Garfield appointed聽 him Ambassador to Liberia, and he died there a few months later on February 13, 1882. The large historical marker at one of the entrances to the park quotes Garnet鈥檚 鈥溾 also known as the 鈥淐all to Rebellion,鈥 which he gave to the National Negro Convention in 1843:
Brethren, arise, arise! Strike for your lives and liberties. Now is the day and the hour. Let every slave throughout the land do this, and the days of slavery are numbered. You cannot be more oppressed than you have been鈥攜ou cannot suffer greater cruelties than you have already. Rather die free men than live to be slaves. Remember that you are four million!In the audience was fellow former Marylander, Frederick Douglass. The address was considered too radical to distribute,but other abolitionists, including John Brown, funded its publication. In 1969, the Henry Highland Garnet Council, which was made up of 36 block organizations,聽 established the park on the site of a former school.聽 Robert Harding, a MICA professor, designed the park and Lena Boone, president of the Council, coordinated the work. The Neighborhood Improvement Program (a federally funded program of the Department of Labor) provided the labor for the creation of the park. The Baltimore City Department of Public Works furnished the walkways and plumbing for the fountain and the Department of Recreation and Parks provided $15,000 for materials. The construction company, Potts and Callahan (still operating today) donated fill dirt for the landscaping. Over the decades the park fell into disrepair. In 2016 the park was renovated by the Marble Hill Community Association. Since 2018 it has been maintained by Friends of Henry Highland Garnet Park. In 2021 volunteers planted a rose walk and installed a bronze plaque (sponsored by the Baltimore National Heritage Area and Union Baptist Church) to honor Juanita Jackson Mitchell and Clarence M. Mitchell, Jr. The Mitchells were important civil rights activists who lived and worked in the neighborhood, and who had entertained Jackie Robinson, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Lady Bird Johnson in their rose garden. A community composting program currently provides fertilizer for the gardens, continuing the tradition of neighborhood care for, and pride in, the park.]]>
Although the famed African American lawyer and civil rights advocate George McMechen is remembered fondly for his service to the community, he is best remembered for living on McCulloh Street. In June 1910, McMechen and his family moved to 1834 McCulloh Street and the local white community reacted with outrage. The first night McMechen and his family stayed at the house on McCulloh Street, white Baltimoreans vandalized it. In the middle of the night, someone broke all the windows and flung a brick through the third-story skylight. In late 1910, white-owned newspapers reported that the vandalism occurred as a direct result of McMechen family choosing to live on McCulloh Street.
In response to the McMechen family, and several other African American families moving to McCulloh Street, the city responded with a segregation ordinance. The ordinance declared: 鈥淣o negro may take up his residence in a block within the city limits of Baltimore wherein more than half the residents are white.鈥
McMechen said of the ordinance, 鈥淚t is my opinion as a lawyer that it is clearly unconstitutional, unjust, and discriminating against the negro, although on its face it appears to be equally fair to white and black鈥.our people feel very deeply the action taken, and there is no doubt but that this feeling will shortly crystallize into a movement against the ordinance which will result in legal proceedings to have it declared void as it certainly is.鈥
McMechen, and another lawyer named Ashbie Hawkins (McMechen鈥檚 sister鈥檚 husband and legal counsel for the Baltimore NAACP), led the crusade in the courts against the ordinance. In the meantime, McMechen was forced out of his house on McCulloh St.
In 1911, Hawkins and another lawyer, Warner T. McGuinn, successfully argued that the West Ordinance was unconstitutional and it was repealed. A pattern then emerged where the Mayor and City Council would tweak the ordinance and re-establish it. McMechen, Hawkins and McGuinn would then successfully argue it was unconstitutional and the ordinance would be repealed. Another segregation ordinance would then be created.
It wouldn鈥檛 be until a Supreme Court case coming out of Kentucky that the Baltimore segregation ordinances would be overturned permanently. After 1910, the West Ordinance, often called the 鈥淏altimore idea,鈥 for promoting residential segregation proved so attractive for White Americans that it was copied in a score of other southern and border cities, including Richmond, St. Louis, and Louisville, Kentucky.
It was from Louisville that the case testing the constitutionality of segregation ordinances came to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1916. It was called Warley v. Buchanan. Buchanan was a White individual who sold a house to Warley, a Black individual. Since 8 of 10 houses were occupied by White people, Warley was not allowed to live on the block. Buchanan sued Warley in Jefferson County Circuit Court to complete the sale. Warley cited the city ordinance as the reason for non-completion of the sale.
Baltimore鈥檚 own Ashbie Hawkins filed an amicus brief on behalf of the Baltimore Branch of the NAACP and appeared before the Supreme Court for this case. After hearing and rehearing the Court made fast work of it. The Court ruled that the motive for the Louisville ordinance鈥攕eparation of races for purported reasons鈥攚as an inappropriate exercise of police power, and its insufficient purpose also made it unconstitutional.
Buchanan v. Warley is one of the most significant civil rights cases decided before the modern civil rights era. After the Supreme Court case, Maryland courts found the Baltimore segregation ordinances unconstitutional as well.
Hawkins continued to work with George McMechen until he died in 1941. McMechen continued to practice law until his death on February 22, 1961. They made an undeniable impact on our country鈥檚 legal system.
As an influential figure in Baltimore鈥檚 African American community, George McMechen served in many important appointed positions throughout his life. He served as a trustee of Morgan College from 1921 to 1939. He was also the first African American member appointed to the Board of School Commissioners. Lastly, he was the first Baltimorean elected Grand Exalted Ruler (National President) of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World. In 1972, Morgan State erected its School of Business and named it in McMechen鈥檚 honor.
The research and writing of this article was funded by two grants: one from the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority and one from the Baltimore National Heritage Area.
]]>Union Baptist Church traces its origins to 1852 and a group of fifty-seven worshipers meeting in a small building on Lewis Street. It was the fifth oldest African American congregation in Baltimore and financed entirely by African Americans. The first pastor of the church was the Reverend John Carey. In 1866, the Lewis Street congregation merged with members of Saratoga Street African Baptist Church, forming Union Baptist Church. When Rev. Harvey Johnson arrived in 1872, he found a modest congregation of perhaps 270 members.聽 Harvey Johnson鈥檚 dealings with the Maryland Baptist Maryland Baptist Union Association (MBUA) in particular, and with prejudiced white Baptists in general, served as a proving ground for his leadership and vision. He took the skills honed in the battle for equality among all Baptists and transfered those skills as he entered the fight for equaliy among all people. Johnson鈥檚 original cause of friction with the MBUA stemmed from its paternalistic approach to black people and black Baptist churches. Not only did black ministers categorically receive less pay than white counterparts, but black churches were slow to realize full and equal political priviledges within the state denomination governing apparati. This problem was more troubling once, thanks in no small part to Johnson himself, black numbers in the state鈥檚 Baptist churches began grow. By 1885, Union Baptist's membership surpassed two thousand members for the first time. Rev. Johnson's response to this discrimination was two-fold: economic independence and institutional autonomy. This situation exploded throughout the 1890s as Johnson urged black congregations to free themselves of white purse strings, and to get out of the Union Association altogether. One of Rev. Johnson's most controversal speeches brought this issue to fore. In September 1897, speeking in Boston, Johnson made, "A Plea For Our Work As Colored Baptists, Apart From the Whites." Johnson called for black Baptists to move as a group toward self-determination. The Union Baptist Church鈥檚 Gothic design features stained glass windows created by John LeFarge, the renowned artist known as the inventor of the art of using opalescent stained glass.
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]]>1234 Druid Hill Avenue had a story unlike any other. When builders erected the house in the nineteenth century it was one of many handsome Italianate rowhouses in the northwestern suburbs of the city. In 1899, as the neighborhood changed from white to black, Harry S. Cummings, a local African American politician and lawyer, moved into the house with his family. Cummings had graduated from the University of Maryland Law School (one of the first two black men to do so) and, in 1890, became the first African American elected to a Baltimore City Council seat. Cummings lived in the home until 1911, when he moved up the street into another Druid Hill Avenue rowhouse, where he lived until his death in 1917.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the building served as offices to the local chapter of the NAACP, hosting Martin Luther King and Eleanor Roosevelt when they came to Baltimore to work with key leaders like Lillie Mae Carroll Jackson. In 1970, the property became 鈥淔reedom House鈥 and continued to serve as a central hub of activism. By December 1977, the organization had 鈥渞eceived many citations including the AFRO鈥檚 highest honor for its successful crusades in reducing unemployment, crime and delinquency.鈥 When Dr. Jackson donated the house to Bethel AME Church in 1977, the deed required that the property remain in community use or revert back to the ownership of her family.
Immediately next door to the site of Freedom House is 1232 Druid Hill Avenue. As late as 1930, the 1232 Druid Hill Avenue served as a residence, then home to Mrs. Ida Barber (n茅e King). That same year, the property is listed as a residence by Rev. J.E. Lee. By 1934, the property was listed in local directories as the office of W. Owens Stewart in his role as Superintendent of Mt. Zion Cemetery for the Baltimore A. M. E. Conference. By the late 1980s, the building had been turned into the Bethel Bible Institute and also provided space for a Women's Resource and Development Center and the Bethel Christian School.
1234 Druid Hill Avenue and its neighbor at 1232 have been owned or controlled by Bethel AME Church for decades. In recent years, the buildings deteriorated significantly and, in July 2015, Baltimore Slumlord Watch highlighted their poor condition. Bethel AME Church responded to these issues by securing a city building permit for both buildings in late September that allowed non-structural alterations and limited interior demolition. Unfortunately, in October 2015 the church changed their plans and received approval from the Baltimore Housing Department to demolish 1234 Druid Hill Avenue鈥攚ithout notifying preservation advocates or the local chapter of the NAACP. At present, Freedom House is a vacant lot, and the future of the adjoining rowhouse at 1232 Druid Hill Avenue remains uncertain.
]]>A neglected brick rowhouse at 1318 Druid Hill Avenue was once the residence of Baltimore鈥檚 first black City Councilman Harry S. Cummings. Harry S. Cummings, his wife Blanche Teresa Conklin and their two children Louise Virginia and Harry Sythe Cummings, Jr. moved to 1318 Druid Hill Avenue in 1911. The family hadn't moved far. They had moved to 1234 Druid Hill Avenue in 1898 and Cummings' sister continued to live in the house up through the 1950s. This house, later known as Freedom House for its' role as offices for the local chapter of the NAACP, was torn down by Bethel AME Church in November 2015. The rowhouse at 1318 Druid Hill Avenue聽was not only a family home but also a place for politics. Cummings campaigned and won re-election to the City Council in 1911 and 1915. In 1912, Cummings hosted the Seventeenth Ward Organization at his home where local Republicans met to endorse President William Howard Taft. Unfortunately, Cummings fell ill at age fifty-one and, on September 5, 1917, the Sun reported that Cummings was "critically ill at his home, 1318 Druid Hill Avenue, of a complication of diseases and a blood clot on the brain. It was said last night that he had not spoken since last Friday." Cummings died on September 7, 1917, at his home. On Monday, September 10, thousands of people, both white and black, visited the Metropolitan M.E. Church on Orchard Street to see the 鈥渞emains lay in state鈥 and hundreds of people visited his home. Rev. Leonard Z. Johnson, the pastor of Madison Street Presbyterian Church, conducted a brief service at 1318 Druid Hill Avenue, remarking:
鈥淭his life is a token and a proof of Negro possibility in the sphere of life achievement, if given its chances to fulfil itself, and while such Negro possibility shows there shall none, of right reason, decry the Negro people and race and reuse right and a place of common human respect and equal opportunity of strong life in the citizen life of the nation.鈥Blanche T. Cummings continued to live in the house up until her death on January 12, 1955, and the property remained in family ownership up until 2005. Despite the deteriorated condition of the building today, the backyard still holds a reminder of the Cummings family鈥攁 rare American Elm planted on Harry S. Cummings, Jr.鈥檚 seventh birthday. Neighbors hope to see the history of this home and memories of the聽Cummings family preserved of for generations to come.]]>
Few often realize that much of the civil rights successes in Maryland and nationally were started by a couple that lived here at 1324 Druid Hill Avenue--Juanita Jackson Mitchell and Clarence Mitchell. The couple served a vital role in the civil rights movement on a local, state, and national level.聽
Juanita Jackson Mitchell grew up just a few blocks away in what is now the Lillie Carroll Jackson Civil Rights Museum, named for her mother who served a paramount role in Baltimore鈥檚 civil rights movement, especially in the 1930s and 1940s.聽
Lillie Carroll Jackson encouraged her daughter to get a strong education. She attended Morgan State University and then transferred to the University of Pennsylvania. When she returned to Baltimore, she learned of a recent lynching of George Armwood, a Black man on Maryland鈥檚 Eastern Shore, and felt compelled to activate other young people in the city.聽
By the age of 18 in 1931, Juanita formed a civil rights group called the Baltimore Young People鈥檚 Forum. The group took on what was then considered radical techniques by many of picketing, boycotts, and sit-ins to protest job discrimination for Black residents in Baltimore. This included leading a 鈥淒on鈥檛 Buy Where You Can鈥檛 Work鈥 campaign and regular mass meetings with famous civil rights leaders of the time first at the nearby Sharp Street Memorial Church and then at Bethel A.M.E.聽
While in the Young People鈥檚 Forum, Juanita met another young person passionate about creating change, Clarence Mitchell. Mitchell had been a reporter for the Baltimore Afro-American newspaper and covered the same lynching that drove Juanita to take action, as well as the trial of the Scottsboro boys, a group of nine young Black men falsely accused of raping a white woman. Mitchell joined the forum, serving as Juanita鈥檚 vice president.聽
In 1935, Juanita delivered a 鈥渇iery speech鈥 to the NAACP national convention calling for a greater focus on youth participation. The national leaders were impressed by her speech and her success with the forum and recruited her to be the first youth leader in the NAACP. She traveled across the country to support and encourage youth council and college chapters of the NAACP, helping them to focus on direct-action techniques to challenge local discrimination, organizing for anti-lynching legal protections in Congress, and securing equal educational and employment opportunities. She herself was a proponent of Black history, compiling a bibliography of sources on African American history and culture and encouraging youth councils to reach out to their libraries and request more books by African American history be purchased.
At the end of her time with the national NAACP, Juanita married Clarence Mitchell and later had four sons.聽
Clarence, also worked to advance civil rights, especially as he began working as a lobbyist for the NAACP. He was a crucial advocate for national civil rights protections, often meeting with high-up Congressional and Presidential leadership to educate them on the need for stronger Civil Rights protections. He testified in front of Congress over 100 times (Juanita also testified often to Congress, including in support of an anti-lynching bill.) He is often cited as being a major proponent of civil rights protections including the 1964 Civil Rights Act, banning the segregation of public accommodations, and the Fair Housing Act.聽
Juanita stayed in this home after her husband Clarence Mitchell passed away in 1984, and remained until her own death at the age of 79 in 1992.聽
Watch our Five Minute Histories video for more on Juanita Jackson Mitchell!
]]>As the legal office for Maryland鈥檚 first female Black lawyer, Juanita Jackson Mitchell, and her husband, Clarence Mitchell Jr., an NAACP lobbyist, this office served as a major site for civil rights organizing in Baltimore.聽
As the daughter of prominent Baltimore civil rights activist Lillie Carroll Jackson, Juanita Jackson was instilled with her duty to fight for civil rights at a young age. By the age of 18, she was leading the 鈥淏uy Where You Can Work鈥 picketing campaigns organized by the City-Wide Young People鈥檚 Forum in Baltimore. Through the Young People鈥檚 Forum, she also met her future husband, Clarence Mitchell Jr., who served as vice president. The two would later marry in 1938 and become a powerful force for civil rights in the country.聽
Juanita鈥檚 leadership was noticed by national civil rights leaders, and she was soon recruited to organize the national youth movement for the NAACP. Partially due to her vision and efforts, the national NAACP began to adopt methods like sit-ins and pickets rather than solely focusing on legal efforts.聽
Juanita Jackson Mitchell pursued a law degree at the University of Maryland and passed the bar in 1950, becoming the first Black woman in the state to become a lawyer. As a practicing lawyer heavily involved in civil rights, Juanita noted that 鈥渓ots of lawyers wouldn鈥檛 even speak to me鈥 I was a troublemaker.鈥
Juanita handled several important civil rights cases in Baltimore as an attorney. Her work led to a Supreme Court case that eliminated racial segregation in city and state beaches and swimming pools. She also worked with Thurgood Marshall to challenge school segregation in Baltimore, making it the first city in the South to desegregate following the Brown v. Board of Education ruling.
As a former student organizer, Juanita worked on the legal defense of student protestors in the 1960s, organizing sit-ins in the city and across the state, including defending those arrested in the protests in Cambridge, Gwynn Oak Park, and across Baltimore City. She also argued a case that ruled that police could not enter private homes without warrants in 1966, a law that remains on the books in Maryland today.
Juanita shared the office with her husband, Clarence M. Mitchell. He served as a key lobbyist for the NAACP, earning him the title of the 鈥101st Senator鈥 because of his influence in working towards key civil rights protections, including the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
This physical office was bought by Juanita in 1950 as she began practicing law. Because of her strong connections to the NAACP, this office was also used for the Baltimore NAACP鈥檚 legal work. After Juanita鈥檚 death in 1992, it remained in the ownership of Juanita鈥檚 son, Clarence Mitchell III, and was later used as offices for the Lillie Caroll Jackson Museum.
The Mitchell Family Law Office remains particularly valuable as the Baltimore NAACP鈥檚 historic office space was demolished in 2015. The site will be renovated as a hub for legal resources for the neighborhood, including housing the non-profit Rebuild, Overcome and Rise (ROAR), a center providing survivors of crime, violence, and harm with access to wraparound legal, case management, and mental health services.
Watch our Five Minute Histories video for more on Juanita Jackson Mitchell!
]]>The Home of the Friendless at 1313 Druid Hill Ave opened as a refuge for orphaned boys in 1870. An earlier institution, the Home of Friendless Vagrant Girls was established in 1854 on Pearl Steet. By 1860, it had moved to a new building on Druid Hill Ave. Five years later an adjoining lot was purchased for the construction of a boy鈥檚 home鈥攖oday鈥檚 1313 Druid Hill Ave.
The orphanage only accepted white children. Between 1870 and 1931, 200 children, half of whom were foreign born, lived here each year. By 1931, the rise of welfare programs, social services, and new approaches to childcare decreased the need for orphanages. The National Register of Historic Places states, 鈥淭he size of the building, the segregation of boys and girls, the racial make-up of the institution and its urban setting are representative of orphanages prior to concepts of civil rights, gender equality and foster care. By the early twentieth century, reformers called for child care facilities in cottage settings far from urban centers.鈥 The institution left the Marble Hill neighborhood for northwest Baltimore and eventually merged with the Woodbourne Center, which still operates today.
The federal Works Progress Administration then occupied the building until Baltimore City bought it in 1938 to create the Druid Hill Health Center. Notably, this was Baltimore鈥檚 first public health center for African Americans. Various health services were offered until 1961. The city鈥檚 Department of Housing then owned the building until 1992. It has been vacant since then.
The Marble Hill Community Association has been demanding that the city stabilize this deteriorating building for several years. In 2021, the building sustained damage from torrential rains. Falling debris became a hazard to pedestrians and traffic. In response, the city said it will stabilize the building.
*The research and writing of this article was funded by two grants: one from the Maryland Heritage Areas Authority and one from the Baltimore National Heritage Area.
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