For nearly 130 years, downtown Columbia’s historic Bethel AME Church provided the city’s African American community with much more than a place to worship.
The first wooden sanctuary, built in 1869, was a place where former slaves found permanence and belonging. The current Romanesque Revival structure, built in 1921 by trailblazing Black architect John A. Lankford, was a place where civil rights pioneers gathered for protection and inspiration.
Despite Bethel AME’s long history as a community pillar, the historic church building has sat empty and unused for nearly 30 years. The church sits at one of Columbia’s major intersections – the corner of Sumter and Taylor streets — in the same block as Prisma Baptist Hospital…