Listed in Arkansas Register of Historic Places on 12/01/10

SUMMARY

Located five and one-half miles southeast of Doddridge, Arkansas, the Promise Land Baptist Church is being nominated to the Arkansas Register of Historic Places with local significance under Criterion A for its association with religious development in Miller County. Because the church is still owned by a religious organization, it is also being submitted under Criteria Consideration A: Religious Properties.

ELABORATION

In 1866, after the Emancipation Proclamation, former slaves (purchased on October 18, 1841, in New Orleans, Louisiana) homesteaded the East Kiblah community in Arkansas from the plantation of Richard Blanton. Representative surnames of the founders of Kiblah between 1853 and 1880 were Nelson, Holmes, Mothershead, Williams, Spearman, and Simington.

The Name Kiblah has a religious meaning and is a derivative of the word “Ka’aba,” or “Caaba,” which means the cubical stone structure in the center of the mosque enclosure in Mecca, toward which all Muslims turn their faces in ritual prayer. The Ka’aba is also known as the House of Allah. It also is said to hold the Black Stone of Mecca that Gabriel was said to have given to Abraham.

During the Civil War the Kiblah community was referred to as the “The Bend,” as in the bend of the Red River (the east boundary of the Kiblah community). According to local legend, both Confederate and Union soldiers took refuge at the river’s bend. Once established as a community, log houses were built as well as three churches (two Baptist and one Methodist), c. 1868. Kiblah continued to operate as a primary agricultural community after the Civil War, with a high percentage of small, row-crop farms mixed with an active timbering and milling industry.

The Promise Land Baptist Church may have been one of the two Baptist Churches from the original town settlement c.1868. It seems to be more likely that the Promise Land Baptist Church was originally founded c.1880. However, local lore says that the building was built in 1885, though the construction of the church places the building roughly around the 1920s and 1930s.

The Promise Land Baptist Church has an incredible rich history and heritage in this community. In the late 1800s Championand Malisia Richardson donated one acre of the land they inherited as former slaves, for the building of The Promise Land Baptist Church.Champion received an initial 160 acres as part of an original homestead, which he was granted on March 1, 1877.[1]

It is said that Champion and other community leaders came together to build the Church. Upon the completion of the building, it is said that they rode to Texarkana,Arkansas, by way of covered wagons to get the deed of the building, the journey took three days.

After returning to the community with the deed in hand, the community celebrated their success and Champ and others in the community decided to design pews for their new community church building. They carved out these pews by hand and they are still in the building today. Champion and his family would remain active in the community until his death on September 4, 1919,[2] and Malissa’s death on September 1, 1941.[3]

At the same time that the Promise Land Baptist Church was being formed in Kiblah a larger movement in the African American Baptist Church was taking place. Just shortly after the Civil War ended, the African American community found themselves at a crossroads in what to do about their religious perspective. At that time they could either conform to the white religious institutions or form their own congregations. Though it would be a tough decision, many did establish their own churches.[4] At this same time the Arkansas State Baptist Convention was becoming a more powerful resource for the African-American churches, most of which was spurred by Elias Camp Morris. Consequently, the rise of the State Convention and the establishment of the Promise Land Baptist Church can not be verified at this time. However, theoretically it can be stated the during this period of time there was also a rise in the number of African-American Baptist church throughout Arkansas. [5]

This influence that has been a part of the community of Kiblah has come from the ideology presented by the Promise Land Baptist Church. Many of the people who chose to have a church marriage came to Promise Land Baptist Church to get married. The Church served as a significant seat of authority in this small community of Kiblah, in the city of Doddridge Arkansas.

This building is still being used today as many of the original community leader’s return to the community every other year for a community reunion, and on Sunday of the reunion, they all gather in The Promise Land to celebrate their heritage. As previously mentioned in c. 1868 there were three church in the community, two Baptist and one Methodist. Now, it is believed that Promise Land Baptist Church is the only church left in the small community.

[3] Malissa Richardson, www.ancestory.com (accessed on Oct. 1, 2010).

[4] Todd Lewis, Elias Camp Morris and the Shaping of Arkansas’s African-American Baptist Church, 27-29 April 1995, paper presented at the Fifty-Fourth Annual Meeting of the Arkansas Historical Association, Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, Department of Arkansas Heritage, Little Rock, Arkansas, 1.

[5] “In 1881, black Baptists did not reveal the number of churches but listed nine associations and 17,194 members; in 1900, they claimed 868 churches, thirty associations, and 59,033 members.” “Baptist,” Encyclopedia of Arkansas,http://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=2558(accessed on October 13, 2010).

SIGNIFICANCE

The Promise Land Baptist Church is being nominated to the Arkansas Register of Historic Places with local significance under Criterion A for its association with religious development in Miller County. Because the church is still owned by a religious organization, it is also being submitted under Criteria Consideration A: Religious Properties.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Lewis, Todd. Elias Camp Morris and the Shaping of Arkansas’s African-American Baptist Church, 27-29 April 1995. Paper presented at the Fifty-Fourth Annual Meeting of the Arkansas Historical Association, Arkansas Historic Preservation Program, Department of Arkansas Heritage, Little Rock, Arkansas.

Hinson, E. Glenn. “Baptist,” Encyclopedia of Arkansas,http://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=2558(accessed on October 13, 2010).

Champion Richardson, Land Patent #1081- Application #3140, (Springfield, VA: Bureau of Land Management), Arkansas History Commission,http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/PatentSearch/Results.asp?QryId=57912.35 (accessed September 1, 2010).

Champion Richardson, www.ancestory.com (accessed on Oct. 1, 2010).

Malissa Richardson, www.ancestory.com (accessed on Oct. 1, 2010).