Items

• Dedication Service of Communion Drapes Bethel A.M.E. Church
  This ceremony documented a church dedication service at Bethel African Methodist Episcopal on January 6, 1952. Located on Rittenhouse Street in the Germantown section of Philadelphia, the program celebrated the consecration of new communion drapes. The service blended liturgy with community devotion, invoked the Trinity and called all generations to gather in unity.
• Flyer for Vacation Bible School
  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.
• [Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Chicken Bone Beach]
  Civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rev. Russell A. Roberts posed for a snapshot while relaxing on segregated Chicken Bone Beach in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
• Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church Sunday School
  The Bethel AME Church in Pennington was built in 1816 by a small group of free African Americans who purchased the land as an empty lot, as well as nearby lots for homes (Katmann 2014, 6). This photograph of the church’s Sunday School features nineteen children, some siblings. Patricia (née True) Payne has identified all of the children in the picture. (See reverse)
• Organ
  Pump organ, pre-1917. Made by the Cornish Company in Washington, NJ, which ended organ production in 1917. Organ was played at the First Baptist Church in Pennington and was similar to the one that provided music at Skillman Camp Meetings from the 1890s - 1930s.
• Wooden collection boxes (two)
  Original to Bethel AME Church. A booklet printed in 1966 in honor of the church’s 150th anniversary says: “Two of the original collection boxes are prize possessions of the church and are still used on special occasions.” On loan from the members of Bethel AME Church in Pennington, NJ
• Paper and rattan church hand fans, 6 fans, 11 sides (Front View)
  Paper and rattan hand fans, mid-20th century. Fans have religious imagery on the front and advertisements for funeral home services on the reverse. Church fans used at Mt. Zion AME Church.
• Mt. Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church (structure)
  Mt. Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church, built in 1899