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The First Baptist Church (also known as the Brick-A-Day Church) on North Ripley Street in Montgomery, Alabama, is a historic landmark. Founded in downtown Montgomery in 1867 as one of the first black churches in the area, it provided an alternative to the second-class treatment and discrimination African-Americans faced at the other First Baptist Church in the city. It also had a role in the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. In the first few decades after its establishment the First Baptist Church became one of the largest black churches in the South, growing from hundreds parishioners to thousands. Almost a hundred years later, in the 1950s and 1960s, it was an important gathering place for activities related to the civil rights movement, and became associated with the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Freedom ride of May 1961. The church was listed by the Alabama Historical Commission on the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage on May 5, 2000. ==History== The congregation first organized in 1866; early parishioners had worshiped during slavery at the other First Baptist Church in Montgomery, on Perry Street. Before the American Civil War, blacks were allowed only on the balcony of that church: "they were never allowed on the main floor of the sanctuary unless they were sweeping or mopping."〔Williams and Greenhaw 101.〕 In 1867, 700 African-American communicants had marched to an empty lot on the corner of Ripley Street and Columbus Street, declaring themselves the "First Baptist Church (Colored)" and founding what became "the first 'free Negro' institution in the city."〔Link 32.〕 The wooden building itself, which faced north to Columbus Street, was called the Columbus Street Baptist Church. The first pastor was Nathan Ashby, who also became the first president of the Colored Baptist Convention in Alabama, founded in his church on December 17, 1868.〔Boothe 37.〕 Ashby retired in 1870, after being struck by paralysis. He was followed, briefly, by J.W. Stevens, and starting in 1871, James H. Foster was the pastor for twenty years. Foster is credited with increasing membership from a few hundred to several thousand; his successor, pastor Andrew Stokes, added even more.〔Boothe 57-58.〕 Fire destroyed the first frame church. Between 1910 and 1915, the church was rebuilt (now facing east, toward Ripley Street) under the leadership of pastor Stokes. Members of the congregation were asked to each bring a brick a day to build it—hence the church's nickname, the "Brick-A-Day Church."〔Townsend 38.〕 The building was designed in the style of the Romanesque Revival by W.T. Bailey of the Tuskegee University.〔Historical marker at the First Baptist Church.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「First Baptist Church (Montgomery, Alabama)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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