Mount Tabor
New Jersey
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The United Methodist Church at Mount Tabor
History:
The founding of the Newark Conference of the Methodist Church in 1857 was coincidental with the resurgence of revivalism and camp meeting enthusiasm especially in the eastern part of our nation. The source of this resurgence laid interestingly enough in the financial crash, which shook the country on October 14, 1857. "An era of reckless prosperity vanished in a forenoon. Public confidence was prostrate. Industry stood still. Ruin confronted leaders in finance and business and immediate desperate poverty was the lot of the wage-earner." It was then that the practice of noonday prayer swept the nation. Springing from the hearts of the people, it was the product of no particular denomination. Known as the Great Prayer Revival, it received the support of the nation's great newspapers and touched the lives of nearly a million people. Thousands were channeled into the churches and the spiritual balance of the American people was restored.
With new vitality the general church began enjoying an advantage not enjoyed for years, namely, a freshened interest on the part of many. How to capitalize upon the opportunity was the question facing the churches. For the newly formed Newark Conference of Methodism their answer was found in the revival of camp meeting. Every Presiding Elder was directed to hold an annual camp meeting in his district. Scarcely nine years later in 1866 amid the planning of celebrations for the Centenary of American Methodism, the Newark Conference in session at Washington, New Jersey appointed a committee to consider the advisability of a Conference Camp Meeting.
The committee moved quickly to its task, for the first Conference Camp Meeting was held in August 1866 at Speedwell Lake between Morris Plains and Morristown. In traditional camp meeting form the services were intensely emotional. The closing evening service "continued until morning and . . . forty souls found peace during the night, and about seventy-five during the last twenty-four hours of the meeting."
Conference Camp Meeting quickly became the fashion. Interest grew steadily.
The attendance during 1867 and 1868 was phenomenal. On the final Sunday of camp meeting in 1867, for instance, Bishop Janes preached to nearly ten thousand people. In 1868 it was necessary to have three ministers reaching simultaneously in different parts of the grounds to over fifteen thousand people.
After 1868 the Speedwell Lake campground was no longer available. The Conference Committee, consisting of the Rev. J. T. Crane, the Rev. C. Coit and the Hon. Peter Smith, moved the enterprise closer to permanence when they reported and the Conference approved the following:
"1. That we deem it important to the interest of Methodism in this Conference to purchase a permanent camp ground;
2. That the payment of twenty dollars or upward shall entitle the subscriber to a lot."
On October 21, 1868 a thirty and one-half acre tract, comprising a wooded knoll, was selected. The site was given the Biblical name "Mount Tabor." The New Jersey Legislature granted a unique charter on March 17, 1869 which provided for the community to function as a municipality within the larger municipality of the township in which it is located. The only other one of its kind is the one held by the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association. The first camp meeting was held August 23 to September 1, 1869. In May 1872 a farm of one hundred acres was added to the original purchase. Since then other tracts of land have been secured.
The campground was laid cut in tent lots separated by an avenue and paths. At the center of the original ground was the Tabernacle facing toward Trinity Circle, which was the focal point of all camp meeting activity. Rough plank benches in the Park provided seating for the services. The original Tabernacle was nothing more than an outdoor platform and preacher's stand situated at the front of a building used to house the visiting preachers.
The streets and avenues in the campground were chiefly named for bishops of the Methodist Church and prominent lay clergymen. Two large seats, later replaced by wooden structures, were erected on either side of Trinity Circle and named Bethel and Ebenezer. They housed many of the smaller meetings during camp meeting. In 1885 the present Tabernacle was erected on the site of the original one. The new structure had indoor seating facilities for 500 persons. An outdoor platform permitted the continuance of open-air services.
With the erection of the spacious Arlington Hotel in 1877, Mount Tabor added a facility unknown to the frontier campground. A summer newspaper, The Mount labor Record, and the erection of cottages to replace the tents began to give the campground an air of permanence. By 1891 the report in the Newark Conference Journal summarized the effects of such establishment.
"This change in the character of the ground was invited from the beginning, though probably it was not clearly foreseen. The ground was laid out in lots and sold. Buyers were enticed by eloquent descriptions. The natural result is a town of houses and homes in place of a camp ground, and this cannot be reversed."
The spirit of camp meeting evangelism seems to have ebbed by 1891. Only the Holiness Meetings under the leadership of Mrs. Osee Fitzgerald, mother of Bishop James Fitzgerald, continued to represent the old camp meeting fervor. These meetings ceased in 1909 at the time of Mrs. Fitzgerald's death.
After 1891 the camp ground, though continuing the forms, changed the focus to that of a religious summer colony where as much time was given to field club and social activity, and to lectures in literature and ancient history as was given to camp meeting. The times were changing from the interests of 1884, for instance, when a day's schedule included:
6am, Morning Prayers, Ebenezer Pavilion;
9am, Family Service;
10:30am, Preaching;
1pm, Prayer Meeting, Bethel Pavilion;
2:30 P.M., Preaching;
4 pm, Children's Hour, Children's Tent;
6pm, Young People's Meeting;
7:30pm Preaching
-. Religious Services were held at Mrs. Fitzgerald's cottage at 8am, 1pm, and 6pm.
The economic depression of the early nineteen thirties brought another marked change to the Mount Tabor Camp ground. Economic circumstances began to force more and more summer residents to make the camp meeting ground their permanent home. In 1935 there were 62 cottages and by 1939, 109 homes had been built. Religious services continued in the summer but a growing permanent community was left without continuous religious organization. As time went by Mt. Tabor was transformed from a camp meeting site to a year around residential center.
The need for the church at Mount Tabor grew out of the fact that here was a place dedicated to the worship of God with a nucleus of houses that could be readily converted into all-year round homes to meet the housing shortage.
In the Bethel, on October 8, 1939, the first weekly gathering for sermons began. For several years services were held weekly in the Bethel with the Newark Conference Camp Meeting Association furnishing a minister.
On May 3, 1942, the Community Methodist Church of Mount Tabor was organized with a membership of 48 and with the Rev. Merritt Sanders as its first pastor.
Rapid growth soon necessitated a church building and ground was broken in 1948. Construction of the present Church was started on June 5,1949, the cornerstone laid and the first service held in the Fellowship Room in 1949 under the ministry of Rev. Dr. Robert D. Simpson. Although a construction company erected the church structure (at a cost of $20,000), the remainder of work was completed solely by volunteers, representing thousands of hours of work.
By 1956, the growth of the community and the surrounding vicinity forced the expansion of the church and church school facilities to what they are now. In 1968 the name of the congregation became the United Methodist Church at Mt. Tabor.
Rev. Dr. Simpson was pastor until 1960; Rev. Robert E. Meloney became pastor and served from 1960 to 1965. Rev. John F. Dow was pastor from 1965 to 1970. Rev. Robert M. Green served the church from 1970 to 1980. Dr. Bruce D. Barrabee became the pastor in June, 1980, followed by Rev. Thomas Christie in 1984. Rev. Marjorie Eriksen was our minister from 1992 through June, 2004, and Rev. Jennifer Cho is our current Pastor.
Since 1869 the camp meeting as a religious medium has come and gone, and The Newark Conference no longer exists; the church falls within the Greater New Jersey Annual Conference, Skylands District. Originally named "The Community Church of Mount Tabor", it is now called "The United Methodist Church at Mount Tabor.
Mount Tabor stands as an historic shrine reminiscent of the evangelism of another day, which contributed so much to the early growth, and strength of Methodism in the Newark Conference. The history of our church is really the history of Mt. Tabor itself, and vice-versa.
The founding of the Newark Conference of the Methodist Church in 1857 was coincidental with the resurgence of revivalism and camp meeting enthusiasm especially in the eastern part of our nation. The source of this resurgence laid interestingly enough in the financial crash, which shook the country on October 14, 1857. "An era of reckless prosperity vanished in a forenoon. Public confidence was prostrate. Industry stood still. Ruin confronted leaders in finance and business and immediate desperate poverty was the lot of the wage-earner." It was then that the practice of noonday prayer swept the nation. Springing from the hearts of the people, it was the product of no particular denomination. Known as the Great Prayer Revival, it received the support of the nation's great newspapers and touched the lives of nearly a million people. Thousands were channeled into the churches and the spiritual balance of the American people was restored.
With new vitality the general church began enjoying an advantage not enjoyed for years, namely, a freshened interest on the part of many. How to capitalize upon the opportunity was the question facing the churches. For the newly formed Newark Conference of Methodism their answer was found in the revival of camp meeting. Every Presiding Elder was directed to hold an annual camp meeting in his district. Scarcely nine years later in 1866 amid the planning of celebrations for the Centenary of American Methodism, the Newark Conference in session at Washington, New Jersey appointed a committee to consider the advisability of a Conference Camp Meeting.
The committee moved quickly to its task, for the first Conference Camp Meeting was held in August 1866 at Speedwell Lake between Morris Plains and Morristown. In traditional camp meeting form the services were intensely emotional. The closing evening service "continued until morning and . . . forty souls found peace during the night, and about seventy-five during the last twenty-four hours of the meeting."
Conference Camp Meeting quickly became the fashion. Interest grew steadily.
The attendance during 1867 and 1868 was phenomenal. On the final Sunday of camp meeting in 1867, for instance, Bishop Janes preached to nearly ten thousand people. In 1868 it was necessary to have three ministers reaching simultaneously in different parts of the grounds to over fifteen thousand people.
After 1868 the Speedwell Lake campground was no longer available. The Conference Committee, consisting of the Rev. J. T. Crane, the Rev. C. Coit and the Hon. Peter Smith, moved the enterprise closer to permanence when they reported and the Conference approved the following:
"1. That we deem it important to the interest of Methodism in this Conference to purchase a permanent camp ground;
2. That the payment of twenty dollars or upward shall entitle the subscriber to a lot."
On October 21, 1868 a thirty and one-half acre tract, comprising a wooded knoll, was selected. The site was given the Biblical name "Mount Tabor." The New Jersey Legislature granted a unique charter on March 17, 1869 which provided for the community to function as a municipality within the larger municipality of the township in which it is located. The only other one of its kind is the one held by the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association. The first camp meeting was held August 23 to September 1, 1869. In May 1872 a farm of one hundred acres was added to the original purchase. Since then other tracts of land have been secured.
The campground was laid cut in tent lots separated by an avenue and paths. At the center of the original ground was the Tabernacle facing toward Trinity Circle, which was the focal point of all camp meeting activity. Rough plank benches in the Park provided seating for the services. The original Tabernacle was nothing more than an outdoor platform and preacher's stand situated at the front of a building used to house the visiting preachers.
The streets and avenues in the campground were chiefly named for bishops of the Methodist Church and prominent lay clergymen. Two large seats, later replaced by wooden structures, were erected on either side of Trinity Circle and named Bethel and Ebenezer. They housed many of the smaller meetings during camp meeting. In 1885 the present Tabernacle was erected on the site of the original one. The new structure had indoor seating facilities for 500 persons. An outdoor platform permitted the continuance of open-air services.
With the erection of the spacious Arlington Hotel in 1877, Mount Tabor added a facility unknown to the frontier campground. A summer newspaper, The Mount labor Record, and the erection of cottages to replace the tents began to give the campground an air of permanence. By 1891 the report in the Newark Conference Journal summarized the effects of such establishment.
"This change in the character of the ground was invited from the beginning, though probably it was not clearly foreseen. The ground was laid out in lots and sold. Buyers were enticed by eloquent descriptions. The natural result is a town of houses and homes in place of a camp ground, and this cannot be reversed."
The spirit of camp meeting evangelism seems to have ebbed by 1891. Only the Holiness Meetings under the leadership of Mrs. Osee Fitzgerald, mother of Bishop James Fitzgerald, continued to represent the old camp meeting fervor. These meetings ceased in 1909 at the time of Mrs. Fitzgerald's death.
After 1891 the camp ground, though continuing the forms, changed the focus to that of a religious summer colony where as much time was given to field club and social activity, and to lectures in literature and ancient history as was given to camp meeting. The times were changing from the interests of 1884, for instance, when a day's schedule included:
6am, Morning Prayers, Ebenezer Pavilion;
9am, Family Service;
10:30am, Preaching;
1pm, Prayer Meeting, Bethel Pavilion;
2:30 P.M., Preaching;
4 pm, Children's Hour, Children's Tent;
6pm, Young People's Meeting;
7:30pm Preaching
-. Religious Services were held at Mrs. Fitzgerald's cottage at 8am, 1pm, and 6pm.
The economic depression of the early nineteen thirties brought another marked change to the Mount Tabor Camp ground. Economic circumstances began to force more and more summer residents to make the camp meeting ground their permanent home. In 1935 there were 62 cottages and by 1939, 109 homes had been built. Religious services continued in the summer but a growing permanent community was left without continuous religious organization. As time went by Mt. Tabor was transformed from a camp meeting site to a year around residential center.
The need for the church at Mount Tabor grew out of the fact that here was a place dedicated to the worship of God with a nucleus of houses that could be readily converted into all-year round homes to meet the housing shortage.
In the Bethel, on October 8, 1939, the first weekly gathering for sermons began. For several years services were held weekly in the Bethel with the Newark Conference Camp Meeting Association furnishing a minister.
On May 3, 1942, the Community Methodist Church of Mount Tabor was organized with a membership of 48 and with the Rev. Merritt Sanders as its first pastor.
Rapid growth soon necessitated a church building and ground was broken in 1948. Construction of the present Church was started on June 5,1949, the cornerstone laid and the first service held in the Fellowship Room in 1949 under the ministry of Rev. Dr. Robert D. Simpson. Although a construction company erected the church structure (at a cost of $20,000), the remainder of work was completed solely by volunteers, representing thousands of hours of work.
By 1956, the growth of the community and the surrounding vicinity forced the expansion of the church and church school facilities to what they are now. In 1968 the name of the congregation became the United Methodist Church at Mt. Tabor.
Rev. Dr. Simpson was pastor until 1960; Rev. Robert E. Meloney became pastor and served from 1960 to 1965. Rev. John F. Dow was pastor from 1965 to 1970. Rev. Robert M. Green served the church from 1970 to 1980. Dr. Bruce D. Barrabee became the pastor in June, 1980, followed by Rev. Thomas Christie in 1984. Rev. Marjorie Eriksen was our minister from 1992 through June, 2004, and Rev. Jennifer Cho is our current Pastor.
Since 1869 the camp meeting as a religious medium has come and gone, and The Newark Conference no longer exists; the church falls within the Greater New Jersey Annual Conference, Skylands District. Originally named "The Community Church of Mount Tabor", it is now called "The United Methodist Church at Mount Tabor.
Mount Tabor stands as an historic shrine reminiscent of the evangelism of another day, which contributed so much to the early growth, and strength of Methodism in the Newark Conference. The history of our church is really the history of Mt. Tabor itself, and vice-versa.