Memories of Charlton County - by Gibson and Mays Back to Table of Contents 23. OLD CHURCH CUSTOMS (Pp 40-42) Services at church were important to my
family as I was growing up, for all of us looked forward to the singing and preaching and fellowship on those Sundays. Young people especially liked church meetings as they did lots of courting at Sunday School and church in the early part of this century. We attended Bethel Methodist Church when we lived at what's now known as the Lee Chancey place, and I attended Prospect Methodist Church when I was a young man and worked for Emory Dean. We came to town and visited
Folkston Methodist Church many times when it was on the west side of the railroad. I've always loved all the good old church hymns but I think my favorite one is "Amazing Grace." There were no Sunday School classes at Bethel when we moved to Charlton County when I was very small but shortly after that, Eustace Wainwright got religion and decided to become a minister. He began preaching in the local Methodist churches and he organized the Sunday School department
at Bethel. We were some of his first Sunday School scholars. We had Sunday School in the afternoon and I was appointed as treasurer of it. But many times I didn't attend for I was running around with John and Owen Gibson, Uncle Owen's boys. When I wasn't there, one of the Dinkins boys took the money up and kept it till he saw me again, then I'd turn it over to Eustace for him to buy literature. Bailey Gay, who married one of Mr. Jesse Grooms' daughters, preached at Bethel
two or three times a month. He was a good local preacher. The Folkston Methodist Church was on a dusty, sandy road and was separated from the railroad tracks by an oak thicket. It had a center aisle down the middle of the church and rows of pews on each aide, with women sitting on one side of the building and the men on the other. The amen corner consisted of about three homemade benches on each side of the pulpit. Usually Mr. Dan Dinkins and Mr. Jesse Grooms sat there and
when they agreed with the preacher's sermons, they encouraged him with a loud "Amen!." Sometimes women would also sit in the amen corner and respond to the preaching like the men. Once in a while the benches would be filled with singers, and their music would really liven up the church service. A few years before the first World War it was decided to move the church across the railroad tracks, hut Mr. Jehu Paxton, who was a member, didn't like that at all. He
lived right next door to the church and was getting old and feeble. He wanted the building to stay where it was because it was easy for him to get to the services, but it was moved anyway. He said he wouldn't attend if it was moved, and I don't know if he ever did or not, for ha died shortly after that. Just before the church was moved, Rev. Arthur J. Moore, who was later elected Bishop, came to Folkston for a great revival and he held services every night, A tent was set
up about where the Johnson Brothers Hardware store is and we sat on benches made of boards held up with blocks of wood on each end. Arthur Moore was such a good preacher that a hunch of us boys walked the five miles to town each evening during that revival. I think he was the hest preacher I ever heard! When we were courting we also attended Philadelphia Freewill Baptist Church. I was there the Sunday that Ernest Altman preached his first sermon. He was a smart man and a
good preacher and had been raised out in the Altman settlement. I took one of the prettiest girls in Folkston, a Robinson girl, with me to church that Sunday. One of the best-liked preachers when I was a young man was Rev. Emory F. Dean. He lived just a short distance from the Prospect church, across the branch. He was an all-round workman and was highly educated. He was the hardest working man, to be sure. He would read books and write sermons till it was too hot to do
that and then go plow in the field! I told Mrs. Dean one day, "He's crazy! He sits in the shade in the cool of the day, writing and reading and now that it's too hot to be in the field, he's working out there!" She didn't like that a bit, and she told me off! He was a real good preacher but he had a habit at prayer meeting that made the service last much longer. As he was finishing up with his sermon, he would say "Now Brother Jacobs may have something to
say." And Rev. G. H. Jacobs, who also lived near the church and was a good preacher too would say "No, I don't know as I have a thing to say," and all the time he was getting up out of his chair and going to the front of the church. This made prayer meeting last a lot longer. A steeple was added to the church when I lived in the Prospect community and I helped Rev. Dean with the project. We made the frame on the ground and got it up on the roof with a rope
and pulley and then nailed the boards on it. When the Dean children were small Rev. and Mrs. Dean and the family took the wagon to prayer meeting. At that time people prayed by kneeling by the pews. After prayer meeting one Wednesday night the family went back home and Mrs. Dean put all the children to bed but found one vacant place. They counted and found that a child was missing and it was Emory. Rev. Dean went back to the church house and found Emory there. He was on his
knees with his head on the pew and was sound asleep! | 
