Jacksonville Community United Methodist Church history – an update

Jacksonville Church sanctuary, May 8, 2019

We made a trip to Upstate New York in early May to review the manuscript books and other church history items my friend Beth found and spent the winter organizing.

We met at her house where she put before me the manuscript book my great-grandmother Jessie (Tucker) Agard worked on from the handwritten notes that I have been transcribing. Through Beth’s research we learned that Jessie finished the first set of minutes dated 1842 through 1946 to the church and then took the book back to continue with the project. Jessie transcribed the minutes through 1957 when Florence Graham took over the task. Mrs. Graham transcribed the minutes from 1957 through 1979.

We then went to the church where Beth showed off its soon-to-be-open-for-the season thrift shop – beautifully arranged, and then we walked across the road to the church. After admiring the quilts on the wall, the sanctuary, and the Rose Window, we went downstairs into a back hallway where the infamous previously locked file cabinet resides. Beth showed us the files she had organized neatly into Pendaflex and manila folders. She then pulled out the drawers of the other file cabinets. So much history; so little time.

The question was: how did I want to proceed with my part of the project knowing there is all this information yet to be digitized? The answer was easy. I’m transcribing what my great-grandmother did and that will be one project done. When that is bound and distributed, we can talk about what else should be tackled and maybe someone in the community will come forward and volunteer for the job.

My dining room table is covered with the handwritten minutes, my typed copy, and ten pages of two columns of index terms that I am working through putting in page numbers. Not as easy as it sounds. The issue comes when there are two persons with the same name or just an initial, and when women in the earlier years were listed as Mrs. and in later years with their first name. I had to consult the U.S. Federal Census to determine who was the wife of Frank Mattison. Caroline is the answer, though the census listed her as “Cardine.” That census also told me that Monroe was their son. I suspect I will be spending a fair amount of time on census research before the index project is complete.

Jacksonville M.E. Church History – Help Wanted

During our week in the Ithaca, New York area for my book tour, I was encouraged to continue transcribing my great-grandmother’s handwritten history of the Jacksonville M.E. Community Church. I was told that there are new people attending the church and they are interested in its history.

The hamlet of Jacksonville, New York had fallen on hard times about fifty years ago when the Mobile gas station at the center of the hamlet leaked huge amounts of gasoline into the groundwater destroying the town’s water supply. People left, and Mobile was forced to buy up the properties. Many houses were torn down.

Residents saved the old Methodist church from demolition. The building was moved in about 1897 from its location on Route 96 to 5020 Jacksonville Road. A graduate of Cornell’s School of Architecture recently purchased the old church building, and he plans to renovate it for living space and community use. To see the old church and the history surrounding it read the article here.

This is where I need help. When transcribing my great-grandmother’s church history I realized there is twenty-seven critical years missing from that document. It ends in 1888 and picks up again in 1915. There has to be documentation of discussions about moving the old church – a substantial building- off the site to its present location and then building the “new” church. So far the only information I’ve been able to find was on FultonHistory.com. An article in the Farmer Review December 3, 1898 tells of the dedication of the new church. In 1905 there are several articles in The Ithaca Daily News about the congregation suing David W. Lewis of Elmira for improper construction. The congregation won the case, and the new church was built without incurring any debt.

The Jacksonville M.E. Church has been and still is an important part of the hamlet. I believe the church’s history, transcribed and indexed, will also be important as the community is revitalized.

If any readers have information or know of anyone who had ancestors who attended this church and might have diaries, journals, or newspaper clippings, please let me know. I have more people and organizations to contact, but so far the history of Jacksonville, New York seems to be mostly non-existent.