This historic general store on the corner of Lamar and Forrest Streets has been well-maintained and is a great example of commercial architecture in late-19th-century Georgia. It is virtually unchanged from its original appearance. The sign notes that the business traded in stoves and crockery. Selling hardware, groceries, and sundries, J. W. Harris & Co. would have been the equivalent of a big box store today.
Americus Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
The Empire Bank Building is the most spectacular Neoclassical Revival structure in the vibrant commercial historic district of Americus, and a landmark of the form. It was built on the site of George Oliver’s store and completed in 1911. I’m still trying to identify the architect. From 1950-1989, it was home to the First Federal Savings and Loan Association. It is presently home to the River Valley Regional Commission and is a great adaptive re-use for an important historic building.
Americus Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
New Corinth Baptist Church is an historic Freedmen’s congregation and perhaps the oldest Black church standing in Sumter County. According to the National Register of Historic Places, it was built by William Hooks in 1870, using lumber from his own mill, for his African-American laborers and their families. Though such a largesse wasn’t unique, it was nonetheless quite unusual at the time. This was just five years after the Civil War. The congregation grew into one of the largest in Southwest Georgia, with nearly 300 members by 1894. A school on the grounds, which is no longer extant, served children of the community until the 1940s.
National Register of Historic Places
I made this photograph in 2008 and rediscovered it when I began re-editing my Sumter County images. The historic, largely forgotten New Era community holds a special place for me as a photographer of rural subjects. Its owners have allowed it to stand, long after it was abandoned, and in doing so they preserved a living museum of a certain place and time. They appreciated what it represented. Letting it go back to the elements is just part of that process.
This was a huge building, almost certainly serving an agricultural purpose. The front section at right was probably an office, while the remainder was a gin and/or warehouse. As best I can tell, the structure has since collapsed or was razed.
The churchyard of Mountain Creek A. M. E. is located in an isolated section of northern Sumter County and reached by a road of deep red clay, perched atop a hill. Named for a tributary of the Flint River, Mountain Creek may be a Freedmen’s congregation, but its history is a bit obscure, as is often the case with the historic Black churches I document. This little building is what beckoned me here in the first place, and it has proven to be as enigmatic as the congregation itself. When I saw the piano [below], I was sure this was the original church, but as I explored the property and learned of an Old Mountain Creek Cemetery, that quickly gave way to a different narrative.
The building is nearing collapse, and I now believe it was a schoolhouse, associated with Mountain Creek A. M. E.
The historic cemetery is full of stenciled headstones, and there are five gravesites painted a shade of bright blue, which some would call haint blue. They are the first of this color that I’ve encountered. [There is also an Old Mountain Creek A. M. E. Cemetery listed on Findagrave, which suggests the congregation was established elsewhere and later moved here. The earliest identified burial in that cemetery is 1902].
An historic church building serves the congregation today, and the front addition, known as the Dr. Russell Thomas and Sister Margarot Camp Thomas Fellowship Hall, was added in 1990.
The church is a typical late-19th/early-20th century form, with separate front doors for women and men.
This appears to have been a general store. Located in rural Sumter County, not far from Andersonville, it’s a very plain structure, made of cinderblock. One can imagine that it was important to the people out here in the country, who probably didn’t go to town very often. General store, as opposed to the more quaint “country store”, is an important distinction, because these places usually sold a little bit of everything, and the owners knew what people needed. It’s possible that it was a commissary. There’s a sign at the roadside that indicates it was part of the Hoke Smith Farm.
As someone who’s traveled the backroads of all 159 counties in Georgia pursuing what is left of our historic architecture, I have been amazed at how much has actually vanished in the 16+ years that I’ve been looking for old houses. Finding a gem like this is what still motivates me to hit the road. This house is a perfect example of the vernacular architecture that characterizes our collective rural history and its setting in a pecan orchard, with spring wildflowers blooming in the foreground, takes one back in time, to lives lived around manual labor and hardship, but also of simpler ways. The red paint is a bonus.
Like many single-pen houses, this one has a shed room across the back. One of the great aspects of utilitarian housing, to me, is its ability to evolve to fit the needs of those who call it home. Also notable in this example are the handmade bricks. I’d guess it was built sometime between 1890-1910.
I’ve been unable to locate any information on this historic African-American congregation, other than the fact that the present structure was dedicated in October 1945 by Rev. D. A. Greene, who was pastor at the time. It’s located between Americus and Andersonville.
This vernacular Greek Revival cottage, built for John Teel between 1836-1840, was one of the most important remaining antebellum houses in Sumter County. As the centerpiece of an historic plantation and farm that have been cultivated for nearly two centuries, it represented both the history of slavery and sharecropping. Teel owned 16 slaves and they almost certainly were integral to the construction of the house. The family who have long owned it did important stabilization work, most obviously by adding a new roof to protect it, so it was a shock to learn today that it has been dismantled and the architectural elements being sold. If you are preservation-minded and can afford the price tag, it might be a good investment.
National Register of Historic Places
Located beside the Colored Hospital, Campbell Chapel is believed to be the oldest black congregation in Americus. In 1869, it began as a part of the white Methodist church, but its members, mostly freedmen, withdrew an formed an independent Methodist congregation, originating with brush arbor meetings led by Rev. Braswell. In 1877, under the leadership of Bishop Campbell, they purchased this lot in the McCoy Hill neighborhood and built a wood frame church to house their growing membership. The congregation named themselves for Bishop Campbell. As Campbell Chapel grew, becoming the “Mother Church” of Americus, the old church was razed and this structure built in its place, in 1920.
The new church cost $20,000 to build and while the congregation counted most of the doctors and other middle class black professionals of Americus among its members and generous donors; Dr. E. J. Brinson, a black physician, successfully solicited donations from members of the white community. The church history is proud to point out that much of the money was raised from small donations by working class members such as sharecroppers and domestics, who often made less than fifty cents per day.
Significantly, it is the work of Georgia’s first registered African-American architect, Macon native Louis H. Persley (1888-1932). After studies at Lincoln University and the Carnegie Institute of Technology [now Carnegie-Mellon University] and teaching architecture for a year at Tuskegee University, Persley and fellow black architect Robert Robinson Taylor (1868-1942) formed the firm of Taylor and Persley. Taylor was America’s first formally trained black architect. Theirs was one of the earliest, if not the first, professional architectural firm of black ownership in the United States. Persley went on to design numerous structures on the campus of Tuskegee University, but also had other commissions in Georgia, including the First A. M. E. Church and Samaritan Building in Athens, and the Chambliss Hotel and Central City Funeral Home in Macon. I believe the Athens and Americus churches are his only two surviving works in Georgia.
The landmark has fallen into disrepair in recent years, but thanks to a grant from the National Park Service, will be restored, along with the Americus Colored Hospital. I had a nice encounter with Bishop Melvin McCluster, of neighboring Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, who told me he had been looking forward to it being restored to its rightful purpose for many years. He noted that the congregation was still active and presently meets in Elijah Smith, Sr., Worship Center across the street. Rev. Gloria F. Wynds is the current pastor.
National Register of Historic Places
Vanishing Georgia: Photographs by Brian Brown 