‘It’s survived the test of time’: St. Mark AME Church in Duluth celebrates 125 years

DULUTH – The historic notice was published along with other news and comings-and-goings in the May 2, 1891, edition of the Appeal, a weekly African American newspaper based in St. Paul.

“Rev. Richmond Taylor has secured a lot for the new church on the corner of Sixth Street and Fifth Avenue and has made the first payment of $100.”

This is the earliest inkling of what would become a gathering place for more than a century: a red brick church tucked into a quiet residential area in Duluth’s Central Hillside neighborhood. Nine years after that notice, members of St. Mark African Methodist Episcopal Church began meeting in its basement. Thirteen years after that, they were able to move upstairs to the newly completed main level of the church.

The building, which has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since the 1990s, is where the city’s chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People started and it’s where W.E.B. Du Bois spoke in front of hundreds in the aftermath of the lynching of three Black circus workers in Duluth.

It continues to host church services, and these days, there is an option to tune in virtually. This week, its members — about 40 are really active — and friends celebrate the building’s 125th anniversary.

“St. Mark is still here,” Rev. Angela Barnes told those gathered for last Sunday’s service, earning whoops and claps.

Saturday’s daylong events range from a barbecue dinner to a preach-off with guest preachers from other churches.

Screens on both sides of the room projected Barnes as she talked about the power of community and the importance of being a part of the flock.

The basement, once the central meeting spot, is now a community gathering space. During announcements, a member called out that she had brought cookies and fruit and set them up in the lower level.

Its members are organizers.

Barnes, who said the church has survived the test of time, said her members all have special skill sets to help out in times of need.

LaVenda Vann sat to Barnes’ left during the sermon and is involved in projects to feed and gather supplies for members of Duluth’s unhoused community. She speaks out against gun violence and was involved in efforts to celebrate various men and women from the church who might not realize all they have given back. She described the experience of church as “joyful.”

She means that literally. She no longer uses an oxygen tank.

Her sister Deborah Aaron has been going to the church for nearly 18 years. She’s involved in the church’s garden and works with children.

“I was searching for something in-depth,” she said of joining the church.

At the time that Taylor made his first $100 payment, the Appeal noted that he was working to raise the next $400 installment, which would be due in 60 days. In bits and pieces, the congregation raised the money to slowly build up the space.

About 300 of its members celebrated laying the cornerstone in May 1913, an event described as coming after more than 20 years of struggle. Several of those present donated $42 to the church, according to the May 26, 1913 edition of the Duluth News Tribune.

The event led to the development of a local chapter of the NAACP, and Dubois, founder of the organization, was its first speaker. He talked about anti-lynching laws.

Details of his talk landed a few paragraphs on page 11 of the next day’s Duluth Herald.

“The war has proved that the interests of all people are so entwined that no people can live alone,” he told the audience of hundreds.

In the application for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places, St. Mark AME is described as playing a “central role in the social and religious organization of the Black community in Duluth and as the only building in the city built by Blacks for Black use.”

Not all of the church’s history makes headlines. Some is personal. On Sunday, a man sitting in the back of the church whispered that he met his wife at St. Mark, divorced her, and later became friends with her. He pointed at a woman a few pews ahead.

Barnes said the church’s history and longevity make it hard not to contribute to its future.