This month the Society’s second major publication, “…and they came to East Flamborough” will be for sale [see heading above]. The book looks at the history of over 40 buildings in the former township which had been erected by the time of Confederation. Around these buildings have been woven the stories that tell how the township evolved from a virtually uninhabited wilderness at the time of its creation in 1798 to one of the most prosperous townships at the Head-of-the-Lake in 1867.
During their history in Waterdown, the various denominations within the Methodist Church have worshipped in several different locations. The oldest building and the only one still fulfilling its function as a church is the former Wesleyan Methodist Church constructed in 1838 on Mill Street North.
In 1808, East Flamborough Township became one of the stations of the Ancaster Circuit that saddlebag preacher Rev. William Case was appointed to by the New York Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church to Canada. His territory stretched around the western end of Lake Ontario, and area popularly referred to as “Methodist Mountain”. Waterdown was awarded to Rev. Samuel Belton as a preaching appointment in 1828, with services held in the village schoolhouse built a year earlier on the corner of James Grierson’s farm. The building was used by the Methodists in the morning and by the Presbyterians in the afternoon.
When the American Methodist Episcopal Church and the British Wesleyan Methodists united in 1833, the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Canada was formed and in 1838 the small congregation in Waterdown chose to erect a church on the present Mill Street North site. Capable of seating 400 people, the original building was described as “constructed of plank, and timbers hewn by hand at a cost of $1400”. During these early years, Ebenezer Culver Griffin served as superintendent of the Sunday School and was a zealous member of the church, instrumental in the formation of a Temperance Society in the village and the establishment of other Methodist congregations in the surrounding area.
The growing popularity of Waterdown and the appointment of the village as the head of a new circuit under Rev. James Messmore led to the decision to renovate the wooden church. By 1865 the building was in a sad state of disrepair. The church newspaper, ‘The Christian Guardian’ reported that “when first erected it had been built of inch boards laid in mortar and firmly nailed together, and after some time was overlaid with plastering. This had not, however, rendered it impervious; in several places the rain had penetrated and evident signs of decay appearing shook the confidence of the people in the safety of the building”.
Rebuilt of pointed rubble stone, the church was enlarged to serve the large and growing congregation. The cost of construction was over a thousand dollars, but only a small debt remained after the opening services, subscriptions and fund-raising. The re-opening service and associated events received considerable publicity from not only ‘The Christian Guardian’, but the weekly editions of the ‘Hamilton Times’ and ‘The Spectator’.
Rev. Egerton Ryerson and W. Jeffers, Editor of ‘The Christian Guardian’, preached the opening sermons on 17 December 1865 to between four and five hundred people. Since the total population of Waterdown in 1865 was 768 people, the occasion received tremendous support and was a reflection of the strength of the Methodist Church in the area.
An account of the following day’s activities at the Township Hall was also reported, “a Soirée in connection with the Wesleyan Church was given by the ladies in the Township Hall. A very large and intelligent audience assembled to appreciate their efforts. Tea was served, the Rev. Lachlan Taylor delivered one of his popular lectures and a select choir from Hamilton entertained the meeting. We are pleased to learn that the net proceeds were over $100 which, will leave but a trifling debt on the church which the friends expect to pay off in a year or two”.
Further union between Methodist denominations occurred in 1874. In Waterdown, the New Connexion Methodists joined with the Wesleyan Methodists, and the new congregation now known as the Methodist Church used the New Connexion building on the corner of Flamborough and Dundas Streets as a Sunday School and the Wesleyan building as the church. A new Sunday School was built in 1880 during the ministry of Rev. Joseph Holmes. Erected at the rear of the church, it was among a number of changes made to the building that also included the construction of a new gallery behind the pulpit for the choir. During the next twenty years, a number of societies within the church sprang up, the Epworth League of the Young People’s Society, the Women’s Missionary Society, the Mission Band and the Willing Workers Class, all dedicated to Christian education and community work.
In 1925, Church Union joined Methodists, Congregationalists and Presbyterians to form the United Church of Canada. In Waterdown, little in the way of change occurred. The building was renamed the United Church and continued to serve the community until 1957 when the congregation moved to a new building, St. James United Church on Parkside Drive, and the original Methodist Church was sold to the Waterdown Alliance Church.
© The Waterdown-East Flamborough Heritage Society 1997, 2023.
Editor’s Note:Waterdown Alliance Church (21 Mill St N) was deconsecrated and became a commercial space.
