Keller Reform Church 9/3/21
Each time Sue and I bike Lower Rail-Trail starting at the Mt Etna access (see most recently the 4/10/21 and 5/20/21 entries), we pass a church and cemetery high on a hill overlooking Fox Run Road just after turning off US 22 about a mile west of Water Street, PA. As we drive by we frequently talk about taking the very narrow 200 yard driveway up the hill to see the church and cemetery. We finally did that on a Saturday afternoon in mid-May.
Frankly, the church looked much different than in the above photo found online <https://www.findagrave.com/cemetery/2305574/keller-church-cemetery> that apparently was taken in the late 1990s around the time of the 150th anniversary. The hedge that spanned the church front is no longer there, and the huge trees in the cemetery to the right of the church had recently been cut down. Debris from the cutting was still widely spread across the cemetery. Some of the trees had grown on top of graves and over grave stones.
The church history, which is recounted at <http://www.isenbergfamily.info/keller-church/> “…traces its beginning back to Rev. John Deitrich Aurandt, a ministerial student from Lewisburg, who brought the Reformed faith to…” the area as a traveling preacher in the early 1800s. By the 1840s, the number of Reform faith followers had grown such that a number of churches were built across rural central PA. This church was built on land donated by John Keller to serve the "Canoe Valley" (after the creek that runs through the valley). Stone from the remains of Fort Lowry, a Revolutionary War era fort in the area, was used for the foundation. “The [church’s] cornerstone was laid on August 11, 1846 and the building dedicated on January 22, 1847. It soon became a spiritual center for the lives of this rural community until 1926,” at which time it was “… closed, but not abandoned”. “…An association was soon formed and trustees elected to preserve this aged spiritual home….”
Currently, “[t]he Church is closed…, except for the first Sunday each August, when the doors are then opened wide to show off its bright walls, many rows of straight back pews, and two imposing black pot-bellied stoves….Gone is the horsehair settee, coal-oil lamps mounted on the sidewalls, the kerosene-lamp chandeliers that lighted the altar area, and a marble topped table that stood…behind the altar railing…The most precious keepsake lost was the pulpit Bible, inscribed and presented to it’s (sic) pastor on it’s (sic) day of dedication in January 1847. There is still hope among the Trustees that someday it will be returned to its rightful place.”
Comments