Pine Creek Church of the Brethren, 1854 — The Township Mother House

1854 – present · Liberty Township

Pine Creek, organized in 1854 in the township south of town, is the Brethren congregation from which the town church and two sister houses grew; it meets today on the Pine–Stanton corner. Shultz's Pine Creek part, read whole, carries the course. Bro. Abraham Whitmer of Sumption Prairie preached in homes and schoolhouses in the South Bend District, "from which have grown North Liberty, Pine Creek, Blissville, Center, Union, Salem and the Plymouth congregations." In 1852 Bro. Washington Fenson, a minister, moved within the present Pine Creek bounds; David Rupel was called to the ministry and built his house "with large double doors, so as to use it for a house of worship as well as a home." "In 1854 Pine Creek congregation was organized, with E. Fenson and David Rupel as ministers, and Bro. Abraham Whitmer of South Bend as elder." David Rupel was ordained in 1856; the first deacons were William Johnson, Abraham Miller, and Michael Miller. In 1866 an East House and a West House were built, homes and schoolhouses having grown too small; the Blissville House followed in 1875 and the Center House in 1877, points later separated. In June 1912 the southern part was organized separately as Blissville. "In 1917 a new congregation was organized in North Liberty, so the West House was torn down and the members in the northwest part of the congregation transferred their membership there." The East House was remodelled, and a 1950–51 remodel costing about $26,000 was dedicated on 8 July 1951 with an address by Eld. Jesse Ziegler. The free ministry ran until 1932; the first pastor was H. A. Claybaugh, and E. Wayne Gerdes held the pastorate from 1947 as of the book; membership stood at 359 as of about 1952. Two identifications this record invites are left open, because no read carrier makes them: Chapman's "two Dunkard churches" of 1880 are nowhere named by Chapman, and Pine Creek's East and West houses, built 1866, are the only two township Brethren houses dated before 1880 by any read carrier — the correspondence is plausible and unproven; and the Dunkard church site beside the township's first school-house of 1838, half a mile south of the village, sits in the same south-of-town country as Pine Creek's preaching points without any read carrier tying it to Pine Creek or to any named house. The 1875 atlas's own history of the county's churches and its Liberty Township map, read for church symbols, are the named settlers (G-RL-5, G-RL-6). The congregation stands on the town's present roll as "Pine Creek Church — 69531 Pine Road, North Liberty, IN — 574-656-2806," and obituary notices from 2001 to 2015 place funerals at "Pine Creek Church of the Brethren, 69531 Pine Road," at "the corner of Pine and Stanton Roads"; the congregation's own site gives "25075 Stanton Rd., North Liberty, IN 46554 — Office Phone: 574-784-2806" and a current Sunday pattern — coffee and connection at 8:30, worship at 10:00 — so both addresses and both phone exchanges print whole: the corner siting would reconcile the two street addresses as two frontages of one site, but that reconciliation is an inference, not a read fact. A district listing at snippet strength names a "Pastor: Nathan Rosentrater"; the name is undated and is not printed as the current holder.