Finding Place in the Archive: A Case Study of St. John [Colored] Missionary Baptist Church, 1866–1900

Abstract

AbstractThis article explores the ongoing preservation efforts of The St. John Fundraising and Preservation Committee at St. John Missionary Baptist Church (SJMBC). The church, founded in 1869 by former slaves, is located in Fort Bend County, Texas, a county which held the second‐largest slave population in the state in 1860. SJMBC sought to develop an archive of historical records to narrate St. John's early history, particularly at sites it intersected with the history of Fort Bend County, Missouri City, and the Dew Brothers plantation during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Because the majority of the church records were lost in a fire in 2006, Friends of St. John needed to locate other sites in the archive where the church's presence and significance were recorded. They recruited researchers, public scholars and architects and developed relationships with nearby universities and churches to aid in their mission. Highlighting several types of source materials such as a slaver's account book, maps, census, deed, and school records and tax assessments held by the county, SJMBC established a historical narrative of the church through a calculated juxtaposition to well‐established historical narratives of significant white people and events in the county.