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Carswell Baptist Church goes back as far as 1876 and
the Carswell Institute. The Rev. E.R. Carswell, in 1875,
came to this area after graduating from tMercer
University and the Baptist Seminary in Greenville.
SC.
In the fall of 1875, some local
citizens thought that a school be built in the area.
Rev. Carswell was asked to be the principal
and operator of that facility. Trustees were
appointed:
A. Rice, Jesse C.C. Milford, Absalom J. Hall, James
McPhail, Robert Nance, Pickens Warnock, Rev, W.E.
Walters. M.W. Spoon, James Smith, and E.R. Carswell.
Mr. Zachariah Hall donated two acres of land and a
two-story building was erected. The first
floor was a school and church. The second floor was
to be a Masonic Lodge. The building was erected and the
school and the church were opened in February 1876 and
named Walters Baptist Church. At the meeting of the
Saluda Baptist Association in August 1876, Walters
Baptist Church was admitted to the fellowship but by
1883, the church had dissolved.
Sometime before or after the turn of the century, the
school became a public school and used that way till the
year of October 1924. Carswell was consolidated
with three other schools and Bowen School opened. After
the old school was moved, circa 1910-1920, another
building was erected on this site.
In the 1930's
a men's prayer group from Iva began meeting on Sunday
afternoons and on August 18, 1935 a church was organized
and named Carswell Baptist Church. The pastor was
Rev. J. C. Dyar Jr.
The original brick
building was built in 1944 and remodeled in 1974-5.
The first addition of the educational facilities was
begun in April 1985 and completed in July 1986.
Work was started in June 1989 to complete the
educational facility and finished in the fall of 1989. A
fellowship building was built in 1980 and enlarged in
1999. |
