Flyer for Vacation Bible School
Item
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Title
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Flyer for Vacation Bible School
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Description
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This is a flyer for a daily Vacation Bible School held in the Sunday School Auditorium at the Mother Bethel AME Church from July 20-31st, 1959.
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The closing exercises and party are noted to be held August 2nd. Youth 3-14 are invited to gather with peers to explore existential questions like “how the World began and why God made it?” Hence, the theme of “God and His World.” In 1795, Mother Bethel organized the first Black Sunday School– meaning this Vacation Bible School held 164 years later is an instance of the church’s commitment to religious education (Howell 2009). The church continues to offer Sunday School and Bible Study, however the land and figures that shaped Mother Bethel are far more historically profound than the programming.
The Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church is located at 419 South 6th Street, between Washington Square Park and South Street in the Society Hill neighborhood of Philadelphia. The land is the “oldest parcel of land continuously owned by African Americans in the United States” (Historical Society of Pennsylvania, n.d.). Initially there were three smaller church buildings on the property, until the present-day church building (where this VBS was held) was erected in 1889 (Historical Society of Pennsylvania, n.d.). The original name of the church was Bethel Church, however Mother was added to indicate that the AME denomination originated there (Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church 2025). The church was a sanctuary on the Underground Railroad in the mid-1800s, and continued to support former slaves post-Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 (Historical Society of Pennsylvania, n.d; Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church 2025).
Richard Allen (February 14, 1760-1831) was a prominent Black religious leader and the first bishop of the AME religion, who purchased the church grounds in 1791 (Historical Society of Pennsylvania, n.d.). He was born enslaved by Mr. Benjamin Chew, a Quaker lawyer who owned much of the Germantown section of Philadelphia as well as farmland in Delaware. He was a personal attorney to the Penn family, and served as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania from 1774-1777 (Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church 2025). When Allen was seven years old, his family was sold to a Delaware plantation owner Mr. Stokley Sturgis who allowed Allen to eventually buy their freedom sometime before 1783. Thereafter, he traveled about the mid-Atlantic region preaching the Gospel (Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church 2025).
Richard Allen moved to Philadelphia in 1786 as he was offered a permanent 5am worship service at the racially integrated religious space of St. George’s Methodist Episcopal Church at 4th and Arch Streets; however he and other African-Americans still experienced hostility and racism (Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church 2025). Allen and some of his peers set out to start an African-American church (Historical Society of Pennsylvania, n.d.). In 1791, Allen and a group of three men– Absalom Jones, William White, and Darius Jinnings– “purchased an old blacksmith’s shop, had his team of horses drag that structure to the Sixth and Lombard site, and from there convened a 10-person congregation” which became the Mother AME church (Historical Society of Pennsylvania, n.d.). Since its inception, Mother Bethel Church has “serve[d] as an active participant on the world stage, advancing the spiritual, social, and civic causes germane to African Americans and others” (Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church 2025).
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Map to the Mother Bethel AME Church address
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Mother Bethel AME Church Historical Marker
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Rights
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This work is not in copyright, but commercial uses of this digital representation are limited. For more information, contact Mother Bethel AME Church and see http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-NC/1.0/
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Creator
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Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church
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Date
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July 20 through July 31, 1959
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Format
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Text
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Language
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eng
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Spatial Coverage
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Philadelphia, PA
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Contributor
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Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church
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Identifier
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XVI. Scrapbook
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Date Created
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1959
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Subject
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Bible--Study and teaching
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Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church (Philadelphia, Pa.)
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Churches, African American
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Vacation Bible schools
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Philadelphia (Pa.)
