91-Year-Old Texas Church is Damaged by Blaze
Louise Love and her sister Bernice Smith had just arrived at the church at 7:43 a.m. to clean and prepare it for Sunday services when they realized something was on fire.
"I went to open all the doors to the offices," said Love, a 70-year-old Fort Worth native who has been a member of the church since age 7. "When I went to the first office, that's when I smelled something."
Love said she and her sister searched the church's many rooms for the source of the smell and found it in the choir room, which was filled with rolling clouds of smoke.
Love quickly called the pastor, then her husband, and then dialed 911.
"I said, 'Y'all come on across the tracks,' " Love said, referring to a fire station across the railroad tracks near the church, 210 Harding St. 'Our church is on fire. All we see is smoke.' "
Before the morning was over, 13 Fire Department vehicles swarmed to the church, a local, state and national landmark with a congregation of 350 to 400. Investigators believe the blaze started in a basement electrical panel and traveled up the north and west walls of the church's annex, said Lt. Kent Worley, a Fire Department spokesman.
"The main body of the church and sanctuary is not affected," Worley said. "There's just some light smoke."
The fire caused an estimated $100,000 in damage to the building and $25,000 to the contents, Worley said.
Church members expressed gratitude that Love and her sister noticed the fire and alerted authorities before it could spread and destroy the building.
"It was the right time," Love said. "God don't ever make a mistake. He don't ever make a mistake."
Janett Allen, a church secretary who rushed to the church from her job with the Fort Worth school district when she heard about the fire, agreed.
"Sometimes in cases like this, it makes you praise God even more," Allen said. "It could have burned down. We were blessed that Louise was here. We're blessed that everybody was so close, even the Fire Department. God is good. He is so good."
The church was built in what was then a predominantly black neighborhood. But many members now live elsewhere and travel to attend services, said Yvonne Allen, another of Love's sisters and a church member for 59 years.
"This is home," said Yvonne Allen, who is Janett Allen's mother-in-law.
Placards at the front of the church give visitors a glimpse into its history.
Founded in 1895 by the Rev. J. Francis Robinson, the 30-member church first met in the local YMCA. Construction of the church building began in 1913. Services were held in the basement until the sanctuary was completed in 1918.
The first Vocational School on the Job Training Program for blacks was held in the church basement under the auspices of the Fort Worth school district. For many years, the church was the site of graduation ceremonies for I.M. Terrell High School.
Although much of the fire damage was not visible from the outside, firefighters had to break some glass, including the bottoms of three stained-glass windows that date to the church's beginning.
Rev. R.C. Johnson, church pastor for 17 years, said the congregation recently spent $75,000 to repair the approximately 40 stained-glass windows and to install protective plexiglass.
"To see them breaking the windows brings tears to your eyes," Johnson said. "But God knows what he is doing."
After the firefighters had left, Johnson stood inside the hazy church, stunned.
"I just don't have words to express how I feel," he said. "I'm devastated, because I never expected anything like this to happen."
Despite his heartbreak, Johnson said, "We're blessed that the damage isn't any worse than it is, even as bad as it is."
"I think the Lord was in the plan all along," he said. "If he had not been, those two women wouldn't have been here this morning to smell the smoke and call the Fire Department."
Johnson said he's confident that "the Lord is going to make it all right."
"All things work together for good," he said, quoting Scripture. "You might not always understand it, but it works for your good."
Staff Writer Melody McDonald contributed to this report.