German Methodist Episcopal Church
( Brown Street United Methodist Church )
| Dates: | 1885 |
| Location: | Southeast corner Ninth and Brown Streets, Lafayette, Indiana |
| Architect: | James F. Alexander, of Lafayette, Indiana |
| Contractor: | Adam Herzog |
| Cost: | $10,000 |
| Remodeled: | 1933 |
| Exterior Restoration: | 1974 |
This congregation was organized in the summer of 1852 under the Rev. Christoph Keller, and met in the basement of the Fifth Street Methodist Church. A Sunday school was also started at this time. Services were later held at First Christian Church at the corner of Sixth and North Streets. Evening services were held by candle light, because the congregation could not afford the $1.20 per gallon price of lamp oil. Gas lights were installed in the fall of 1855, soon after the Lafayette Gas Works was chartered. In the fall of 1857, a lot at the southeast corner of Ninth and Brown Streets was purchased of $1,100. An old house was rented, and was used by the congregation until a new church could be built. In 1858, a new 30x40 foot frame church and a parsonage were built on the lot at the southeast corner of Ninth and Brown Streets (the church was behind the current church and faced Ninth Street). The church cost $2,800 to build, and the parsonage, $1,200. A new parsonage was built in 1864 for the Rev. D. Valz, costing $925. In 1878, the congregation had a membership of about 150, with a prosperous Sunday school. By the mid 1880s, the congregation had outgrown the old church.
The current brick building was built in the summer of 1885, and cost $15,000. A new parsonage was also built at this time. The contractor for the buildings was Adam Herzog. The new church was dedicated by Dr. H. Liebhard on October 11, 1885. The church originally had a reed organ. In 1886, the 23rd conference of the Central German Conference was held in the church. Dr. William Nast, the founder of German Methodism, attended the conference, which was during his fiftieth year as a German Methodist.
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| Exterior in 1890 | Exterior in 2005 |
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| Entrance with stained glass transom | Detail of tower |
The Epworth League, later the Methodist Youth Fellowship, held their ninth Convention in the church on June 23, 1901. Gifts to the church in 1905 allowed the congregation to replace the original reed organ with a pipe organ. In 1919, the official board of the church decided to switch to English as the language of the church, and the name was changed to Brown Street Methodist Episcopal Church. The word “Episcopal” was dropped from the name in 1933, after a change occurred in all of the churches of the Northwest Conference the Methodist Episcopal church. In 1933, lightning struck the steeple, and it was badly damaged, but, luckily, no fire resulted. The steeple was rebuilt, and the interior of the church was redecorated. In 1974, the exterior of the building was restored.
There were originally two services held on Sunday, along with two Sunday School classes, two Tuesday evening classes, a sermon on Wednesday evening, and a Friday evening prayer meeting (which was held in the country). The congregation had many church-related organizations, including the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society, organized in 1874, the Ladies Aid Society, organized in 1887, and the Epworth League (later called the Methodist Youth Fellowship), organized in 1889.