Welcoming walkway to the North Settlement Church, along Route 10 in the town of Ashland, listed on the National Registry of Historic Places. A sign dedication ceremony is scheduled for September 13, at 11 a.m.
Francis Burns spent part of his youth in the North Settlement Church community, rising to historic levels in the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Easter Sunday in the spring of 1957 when current North Settlement Church Restoration Committee members Dawn Thorp and Louise Lebrun were congregation children. Dawn is on the far left with her father, her head lowered. “I didn’t love my picture taken, even back then,” she says, laughing. Louise is in the front row, on the far right.
By Michael Ryan
ASHLAND - It’s just a building but then again it is so much more for North Settlement Church restoration committee members who are hosting a special plaque dedication, this coming weekend.
The sign, which will be unveiled on Saturday, September 13, at 11 a.m., is a tad tardy in arriving, announcing that the little chapel along Greene County Route 10 is on the National Registry of Historic Places.
That particular notoriety happened in 1976, fifty years ago, but time passes differently in the spiritual realm, and the timing actually couldn’t be better.
North Settlement Church is having its 200th birthday in 2026 with another celebration already being planned, and that isn’t yet the whole story.
This rural community, where the church rose in the hills high above the town of Ashland, was the childhood home of Francis Burns.
Thirty-two years after the House of Worship was constructed, Burns was ordained the first missionary bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church.
And while in today’s world the ordination might attract scant attention, it was no ordinary situation, occurring shortly before the Civil War.In a Rootsweb history of the church, it is written that, “Francis Burns was an [African American] boy of eight, living in Albany, when a North Settlement farmer named Bennett Atwood saw him and was impressed.”
The history, collectively authored by Paula Scarey, Margaret Mulford and Dawn Thorp, further states, “Atwood convinced the boy’s parents that he should be bound over to Atwood to work on his farm.
“Francis came under the special tutelage of the local school-mistress, the daughter of a Baptist clergyman, who taught him the beginnings of the ways and requirements of religious faith,” the history states.
“This Christian upbringing was soon continued by the Methodist society. As time wore on, a camp-meeting was being held on the farm of Arad Lewis, near, or a little west of North Settlement Church,” the history states.
“It was at this camp-meeting that young Burns experienced religion. He earnestly sought Christ at this place,” the history states.
“As Burns himself told it, he knelt down by an old stump and earnestly plead with the Savior to speak peace to his soul,” the history states.
Burns went on to become the first African-American bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church, prompting the history writers to state, “for a little country church, [North Settlement] certainly has a lot to be proud of.”
It is a feeling that continues to inspire restoration committee members such as Thorp and Louise Lebrun, who like Burns, grew up in the embracing shadow of the North Settlement Church steeple.
“We went to church there every Sunday, and we all used to be cutups in Sunday School, so now we have to pay back,” Thorp says, smiling.
There are many, deeply emotional reasons to pay homage to the church and its faithful congregation. “This building was built in 1826 by the members of a Methodist society formed in 1805 under the guidance of the Rev. Seth Crowell,” the history states.
“In the latter part of the year 1856, the inhabitants thought the old edifice must be re-erected or else they could not have service in it, on account of its old and decayed condition,” the history states.
Resolving to restore the church, a committee of three was named, raising $900 for the heavenly task, completing a “nice comfortable edifice “and starting a tradition of devotion that continues two centuries hence.
“Whenever I walk in the church, I think of the many generations who have done the same,” Thorp says. “We are all part of this beautiful church.”
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