Annie Small remembers walking to church about 80 years ago.
It was a relatively short stroll, and when the weather was nice, it was enjoyable.
She remembers her father scooping her up and putting her on his shoulders when they reached the creek. He would walk through the water, giving Annie a great view. The familiar and serene Southern trees and brush excited her because she would soon arrive at what she calls her community’s cornerstone: St. Peter Missionary Baptist Church.
“Growing up, it meant a lot. It was a meeting place,” she said. “It’s getting smaller and smaller and I hate to see that. This was a cornerstone in the community. This was a meeting place. Where is the next generation?”
St. Peter Missionary Baptist Church, a Black church near Garden City, was founded in 1913.
Small, the granddaughter of the founding members, said St. Peter’s used to have a larger congregation. She said there were many children and large families. But in recent decades the number of attendees at Sunday services has dwindled.
“We had a lot of fun, a lot going on," she said. "We had so many children. Now, nobody is having babies, it seems like."
St. Peter’s is one of several Black churches in Horry County that has been seeking a spot on the Horry County Historic Register.
Salem AME Church in the Bucksport community was added to the register at about the same time earlier this year as Saint Peter’s.
Two other churches in northern Horry County, High Hill Baptist Church outside of Loris and Saint Paul’s AME Church in Little River, are on the county’s historic register.
In Conway, Cane Branch AME Church, Brown Chapel AME Church and Mount Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church Cultural Sight have been added to the register.
Being on the county’s historical register will help secure the future of these historic Black churches.
Susan Platt with the Horry County Historic Preservation Commission said that being on the register protects the structure into perpetuity.
“The reason that it was important for these Black churches to be added to the registry is that when you’re applying for any kind of grant or financial incentive where taxpayer money or money is being exchanged, they want to know that the structure will be protected into perpetuity and our registry affords that protection,” she said.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Preserving Black Churches incentive is allotting grants ranging from $50,000 to $200,000 to certain historic Black churches throughout the country and if churches that are applying for this grant are on their local registers, it is more likely they will receive a grant.
These grants, according to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s website, are meant to help “strengthen capacity for historic congregations, preservation organizations, and community groups to better steward, manage, and use their historic structures.”
Small said that St. Peter’s is not the only church worried about having younger generations keep the church going.
Deacon James Small of St. Peter’s said that on top of applying for grants, the church also needs to do more outreach in order to preserve the future of his beloved church that he has attended his whole life.
He’s seen St. Peter's change throughout his life, not only in congregation size, but in the physical building, too.
“I remember my grandfather would come early in the morning and turn the heat on," James Small said. "He would walk here and start the fire then come back in a few hours for the service to start."
Now, the building is complete with electricity and central heating and cooling, a stark contrast from how the church looked when the original congregation first gathered in 1883.
Annie Small said that the church started as a bush church under a different name.
New Hope was a tent made of bush, she said, and when it burned in 1912, from the bush fire she guessed, St. Peter’s was built and named in its place in 1913. New Hope and St. Peter’s have seen the leadership of about 20 pastors, many of which belonged to the Small, Gardner or Washington families, she said.
“This was a beautiful spot in the community. A lot of love,” she said. “We used to have lunch together standing under the trees for special occasions.”
For some properties, the trees are largely what earn them a spot on the register, Platt said.
“Mt. Pisgah Missionary Baptist Church Cultural Sight was added in 2021. Their church had had so many alterations to the exterior that you could only see any of the original structure from the back of the church, but the trees were there and that’s how some of these churches started was that they met under trees,” she said.
Lou Conklin, staff liaison for the Horry County Historic Preservation Commission, said that everything on the register must be at least 50 years old.
Brown Chapel AME Church in the Bucksville community is celebrating its 155th anniversary in March.
“It’s a small church with a big heart,” lifelong attendee Cynthia Funches said.
During his first sermon of Black History Month 2023, the Rev. Michael Scott told his congregation that Brown Chapel celebrates Black history every week of the year.
"We are a phenomenal people," he said. "Educate young people. ... Let them know of the great things we have done."
There are hymnals in the pews, but most attendees did not have to touch them.
As they sang the lyric, "Keep me in your pathway, Lord," it was evident they had sung those words many times before in unison with one another. Some sang loudly, their voices filling the old sanctuary.
Others' voices were soft and their eyes were closed with their hands out and open as if to receive a gift.
Horry County's historic Black churches mean a lot to the Black community. These old buildings have been a place of refuge, familiarity, and love for so many. Congregants throughout the county are eager to preserve their churches' futures.
“We want our churches to be saved because it helps with national fund eligibility,” Conklin said.
To be on the county’s historic register, the property must be in the unincorporated parts of Horry County.
“We want churches to be on there because some of the architecture from the structures is just amazing and a good representation of the architecture at the time these churches were built so we’re not necessarily just limiting it to African-American churches, but what is going on in the national level in historic preservation is underrepresented communities which are African-American communities, tribes and immigrants,” Platt said.
Requirements and directions for applying to be added to the register can be found on the county’s website.
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