Olivet A.M.E. · the mother church

1870 – present

Organized five years after the city itself: In 1870 the Rev. John Bundy and nine charter members — among them Farrow and Rebecca Powell — organized Olivet African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first Black church in South Bend and for many years the only African American congregation in St. Joseph County. The society incorporated on 16 March 1871 as the "Olivet Chapel Society of the A.M.E. Church in South Bend," bought its site at 310 West Monroe Street the same year, and worshipped there for a century: the first building rose in the late 1870s, and the present sanctuary on the site was dedicated 4 February 1917. For decades Olivet was, in the words of the 1994 landmark record, "the only center of the social, religious, and political life of the city's African-American community." The abolitionist Sojourner Truth was welcomed there, by the congregation's tradition as carried in its National Register nomination; the young NAACP chapter held early meetings under its roof; and its daughter congregations — Pilgrim Baptist, First A.M.E.

Zion and others — led the Common Council in 2017 to call 310 West Monroe "the cradle" of Black worship in the city. The second Black congregation was Baptist: Mount Zion Baptist Church, founded in 1890 out of Olivet under the Rev. W. M. Ridley at 116 North Birdsell Street, the city's first Black Baptist church, renamed Pilgrim Baptist in 1935. On the east side, Taylor A.M.E. Zion Church at Eddy and Campeau, served under the Rev. Buford Gordon from 1920, built the larger building the Klan tried to stop (below). A Purdue study of the founding congregations adds a fourth, Laymen Chapel C.M.E. Church. Urban renewal ended the Monroe Street century: the congregation moved in 1969 to 719 North Notre Dame Avenue, where Olivet still worships, and the 1917 sanctuary at 310 West Monroe stands as a local historic landmark, recognized by the Common Council on the building's centennial in 2017.

Sources:

1. IU South Bend Civil Rights Heritage Center, African American Landmark Tour, "Olivet A.M.E. Church" — organized 1870 by the Rev. John Bundy and nine charter members; the Powells among them; incorporation (the tour prints 1872; the church's own 127th anniversary program and the 1994 landmark report give 16 March 1871, and that date is carried here).
2. City of South Bend, Special Proclamation No. 11-2017 and Ordinance record for 310 West Monroe Street (Historic Preservation Commission report, September 1994) — the 1917 sanctuary's dedication, the trustees' 1871 purchase, Olivet as "mother church" and "cradle" of Pilgrim Baptist and First A.M.E. Zion.
3. Indiana Landmarks (June and August 2022) — first and for many years only Black congregation in the county; the Sojourner Truth welcome and early NAACP meetings as the National Register nomination carries them; the 1969 move to Notre Dame Avenue.
4. African American Landmark Tour, "Pilgrim Baptist Church" (via Clio, Garner and Dukes) — Mount Zion Baptist founded 1890 out of Olivet A.M.E. under the Rev. W. M. Ridley, 116 N. Birdsell St.; renamed Pilgrim Baptist, 1935.
5. Danisha L. Marable, "Christianity for Negroes" (Purdue University M.A. thesis) — the four founding congregations: Olivet A.M.E., Pilgrim Baptist, St. Augustine's, Laymen Chapel C.M.E.