Remember When: Water memories and old churches

By Guest Columnist Mary Jane Boutwell

Everywhere you look, a memory is made or stirred. Just down the road from where I grew up, the cow pond shape is still there. Run off from the pasture and row crops-erosion-has filled most of it. Water will puddle for a while after a good rain. I have heard that is where the megasite fire station is to go. But memories- my younger brother, James Leslie and I would go down and hang on the barbed wire fence when Priestley Chapel would have a baptizing. We hung there quietly, even with the barbs poking, quietly with big eyes.
Leon’s home church out in Inverness would go to Charles Juan or 4-Mile Lake for their services. The location changed as run off from cultivated fields, dirt or chemical, polluted the lake. 

Talking with Leon about this, he remembered an outdoor baptistry at Mt. Elam. It appeared to be made of concrete blocks and painted blue. For some years earlier, the church used a pond in the field across the road. But when the field was put into row crops, the church was unable to mow around the pond to drive snakes away. 

Talking with a former neighbor at the Old folks gathering at Old Madison Presbyterian Church, I learned that he also watched the Priestley Chapel baptisms. But something was added. His older brother would buy drinks and snacks to sell at the funeral held across the road from where I grew up.

Mount Hope used a pond on Mr. Marion Davis’ place for baptisms. They would go to church for the service and cross the road to go to the pond. On the way, anyone to be baptized went into the Davis home to change clothes. Afterwards, they would go back in the home and change back into their day clothes, then back to the church for the rest of the service. 

What changes! Oh, a lot of these ponds were used by cows for water and whatever. 

Also, I know of a young father that baptized his two older children. The church went to a small, free flowing river for the service. One of the youngsters was a little short and when the preacher raised his hands in praise, the youngster started to float down the river. Everyone was either reaching and/or laughing. 

A couple of corrections. The raw milk was hauled from the barn to the creamery in five or ten gallon metal milk cans. Also, one of the state maps has Highway 51. We think of it as old today or Old 51 Road. The difference fifty or sixty years ago can make. Nowadays, Highway 51, at one time a major North/South Corridor, is just a highway, like 16 or 22. During WWII, it was THE highway, North to South with the Gulf as the terminal.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Mary Jane Boutwell is a passionate historian and is thrilled to share stories about way back when.