Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church
Title
Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church
Creator
Avery Jackson
Source
Historical Image - Photograph circa 1900 by Gordon S. Hatfield, Tusket, NS
Church Name
Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church
Church Association
Yarmouth Association
Province
Nova Scotia
County
Yarmouth County
Address
9019 Highway 3, Pleasant Lake, Nova Scotia
Status
Active
Date
Built circa 1867
Historical Information
The church was built as a Calvinist Baptist Church around 1867, later becoming a United Baptist Church in 1906 as a result of the union of the Calvinist Baptist and Free Baptist Churches. This building was built in the Meeting House Style. The Meeting House style was typical of Baptist and Congregational congregations around this time frame in Atlantic Canada, due to its simplistic and rather quick-to-build design. The Meeting House style is characterized by a 1 ½ storey wood-frame construction, with either one or two entranceways located on the gable end. This building would have been covered in either wooden clad boards, or cedar shakes, and had a roof covered in wooden shingles. Heating sources during this time consisted of either a wood or coal burning stove, with illumination within the building coming from either whale oil or kerosene oil lamps.
Later there was the addition of an ell on the building’s northeast corner. After the 1906 unification of Free and Calvinist Baptists, the Free Baptist Church building was either moved intact or dismantled and the material moved east along Highway 3 to become the ell that has served as “the Vestry”, a Sunday school hall, a men’s prayer breakfast room, a choir room, a potluck dining room, etc An electric stove was installed; however, water was, and still is carried in as needed.
The style of the building is typical of Baptist churches constructed in Atlantic Canada in the mid nineteenth century, evident through the use of prominent hoods over the gabled windows and the portico-like hood over the single entrance door, centered in the front. It lacks a steeple or bell tower, but there is a bell mounted on a stand with the lower portion being the church sign, situated to the right of the front door. The bell formerly was mounted in the north bell-tower of the Bayview Baptist Church at Port Maitland, NS until in 1978 when that bell was removed from the tower, and placed on the lawn in front of that church before the tower was taken down to provide for a newly designed north entrance. This bell was made by the C.S. Bell Company of Hillsborough Ohio. It is a 33 inch bell, a very common size, and was crafted by the manufacturer of other church bells throughout Atlantic Canada, such as the Clarence United Baptist Church in Clarence, Annapolis County (which has a bell from circa 1902). No bell is evident in the image of the Pleasant Lake Baptist Church dated from 1902, and the church facility looks a lot like it does today (2023). However, sometime in a later decade that bell was moved from Port Maitland to its current (2023) location in front of the Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church (#1019 Highway #3).
A striking feature of this church facility is the presence of three straight point gothic windows on the right eave-side of the building.
The church whose building became the Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church’s ell was part of a group of Free Christian Baptist Churches in Yarmouth County, including Rockville, Arcadia, Little River, Melbourne, Brooklyn, Chegoggin (Session Hill), and Pleasant Lake (also called Salmon River and Riverdale).
Information provided by Atlantic Baptist Archives; What’s Cookin, Ladie’s [sic] Auxiliary of the Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church, History by Mrs. George A. Brittin (c. 1960) and Rev. Ron Baxter, a former member of the church and CBAC’s Baptist Historical Committee member.
Historical Image - Photograph circa 1900 by Gordon S. Hatfield, Tusket, NS.
Later there was the addition of an ell on the building’s northeast corner. After the 1906 unification of Free and Calvinist Baptists, the Free Baptist Church building was either moved intact or dismantled and the material moved east along Highway 3 to become the ell that has served as “the Vestry”, a Sunday school hall, a men’s prayer breakfast room, a choir room, a potluck dining room, etc An electric stove was installed; however, water was, and still is carried in as needed.
The style of the building is typical of Baptist churches constructed in Atlantic Canada in the mid nineteenth century, evident through the use of prominent hoods over the gabled windows and the portico-like hood over the single entrance door, centered in the front. It lacks a steeple or bell tower, but there is a bell mounted on a stand with the lower portion being the church sign, situated to the right of the front door. The bell formerly was mounted in the north bell-tower of the Bayview Baptist Church at Port Maitland, NS until in 1978 when that bell was removed from the tower, and placed on the lawn in front of that church before the tower was taken down to provide for a newly designed north entrance. This bell was made by the C.S. Bell Company of Hillsborough Ohio. It is a 33 inch bell, a very common size, and was crafted by the manufacturer of other church bells throughout Atlantic Canada, such as the Clarence United Baptist Church in Clarence, Annapolis County (which has a bell from circa 1902). No bell is evident in the image of the Pleasant Lake Baptist Church dated from 1902, and the church facility looks a lot like it does today (2023). However, sometime in a later decade that bell was moved from Port Maitland to its current (2023) location in front of the Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church (#1019 Highway #3).
A striking feature of this church facility is the presence of three straight point gothic windows on the right eave-side of the building.
The church whose building became the Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church’s ell was part of a group of Free Christian Baptist Churches in Yarmouth County, including Rockville, Arcadia, Little River, Melbourne, Brooklyn, Chegoggin (Session Hill), and Pleasant Lake (also called Salmon River and Riverdale).
Information provided by Atlantic Baptist Archives; What’s Cookin, Ladie’s [sic] Auxiliary of the Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church, History by Mrs. George A. Brittin (c. 1960) and Rev. Ron Baxter, a former member of the church and CBAC’s Baptist Historical Committee member.
Historical Image - Photograph circa 1900 by Gordon S. Hatfield, Tusket, NS.
Files
Collection
Citation
Avery Jackson, “Pleasant Lake United Baptist Church,” Atlantic Baptist Built Heritage Project , accessed April 29, 2024, https://atlanticbaptistheritage.omeka.net/items/show/482.