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What if they fixed up the building and used it to house a museum devoted to African-American church history?
The idea caught on, and now five years later, the 250-member congregation in Huntersville is moving forward with that plan.
When the project is done, organizers envision the African-American Museum of Church History will be part tourist stop and part teaching facility.
Cureton-Borders, a member of Mount Olive Baptist for more than 40 years and whose father, the late Rev. Max McIlwain, once pastored there, said the history of the black church has gone largely untold.
"How has the African-American church historically been that rock, that foundation, from which everything we do (in the black community) happens, politically, socially, economically?" she said.
Cureton-Borders, a retired elementary school principal, said she hopes the museum will attract schools and seminary students, or anyone who values history and culture.
That history will be told primarily through the evolution of Mount Olive Baptist, founded in 1868 by former slaves and sandwiched between historic Latta Plantation and the lesser-known Rural Hill plantation.
"If you look at the history of Mount Olive, it actually parallels the history of most black churches," she said. "We are all rooted in the same experience and were encouraged in the same way."
Pearlie Cureton-Borders, minister of Christian education at Mount Olive Missionary Baptist Church, in front of the 1916 house in Huntersville that the church hopes to convert into the African-American Museum of Church History
The museum will start off with artifacts - pews, podium, a communion table, and more - taken from the original Mount Olive Baptist, which was destroyed by fire in 1963.
Church and project leaders also are considering whether to excavate the church's original outdoor baptistery, which was paved over many years ago to expand a parking lot. And then there's the church cemetery, which has markers dating to the late 1800s. Cureton-Borders said she wants to catalogue some of the more historic graves.
The museum won't be totally about Mount Olive, Cureton-Borders said. Project leaders also will ask other black congregations to share their histories.
"We want to connect with as many community people as we possible can to help us realize this vision," she said.
Project leaders are talking with officials at Latta Plantation about ways the two might partner. Cureton-Borders also has been meeting with other churches - black and white - whose histories dovetail with project objectives.
SOURCE: Charlotte Observer - Glenn Burkins
