Historical Wyoming County April 1959 - Old Fulton History

Page 66 April. 1959
HISTORICAL WYOMING
Published quarterly at Arcade, New York, under sponsorship of the
Wyoming County Board of Supervisors, by Harry S. Douglass, County
Historian; Robert W. McGowan, Associate Editor, and Students of
the Arcade Central School Commercial Departments
BENNINGTON CHURCHES (cont.)
five, making it impossible to maintain a church there. It was then
sold to the Baptist Society in Cowlesville, and they dismantled it
and had it rebuilt as an addition to their existing church building.
The United Church of Christ of Bennington Center is a wide awake
church today. The building was erected by a. Presbyterian society
organized in l8l8. History relates, "That on December 3» l8I4.il, a
pastor was installed and the new house of worship dedicated." In
: 1878 the building was leased by the German Lutheran Society for a
period of fifteen years. The early Presbyterian society of Bennington
has long been extinct. Later on, the church became known as the
Salem Evangelical and Reformed Church up to 1957. When that denomination
merged with the Congregationalisms, it was named the United
Church of Christ,
The building has been modernized and beautified. It has new
pews, stained glass windows and a Hammond organ with chimes. There
is now a membership of 11+5. The church is presently without a resident
pastor since the Rev.Albert Meusling suffered a stroke in 1957®
He was preceded in the neighboring parsonage by the Rev. Gerald
Rummer in 1953 and the Rev. Arthur Beisheim in 1951.
East Bennington Church
The East Bennington Evangelical & United Brethren Church dates
back more than 100 years. The land on which it stands was given by
Matthew Hubbard, great grandfather of Mrs. Wallace Urf, who is a
member and an active worker there today. Until 1900, all services
were in German.
The forty members of those days were lovers of music and according
to one interesting story, the Hubbard brothers who resided just
across the road carried their melodeon into the church every Sunday
morning. In 1918 new pews and stained glass windows were added along
with other improvements to add dignity to the services. The present
membership of 30 i's served by the Rev., Frederick Carlsen of Warsaw
•who preaches every Sunday at 8:30 to enable him to reach two other
churches on time. A Ladies Aid Society that is forty years old and
a Youth Fellowship under the leadership of Marion Maxon and Gloria
Kern, both help to maintain interest in the church.
The Roman Catholic churches in Bennington township date back to
I8I4.7, when a few families met in a house on Allegany Road north of
the Center, where a service was held by a Buffalo priest who urged
them to organize and erect a church. They met regularly, sometimes
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