2020 National Gathering Hosts: Blacknall Memorial Presbyterian Church

Fellowship Team TFC2020 January 13, 2020 | 0

The 2020 National Gathering is being hosted by our friends at Blacknall Memorial Presbyterian Church located in the heart of Durham, NC near Duke University.

From the Blacknall website…

[Blacknall Memorial’s] roots in Durham are deep and date back more than one hundred years. On Sundays in the 1890’s, brothers Richard and James Blacknall, elders in Durham’s First Presbyterian Church, along with their wives, would ride the train out to the Erwin Textile Mill village to conduct Sunday School in an abandoned barroom. By 1916 the “mission” had grown and a frame building was constructed. The congregation was established as a Presbyterian Church with the Blacknall family memorialized in the name. That building was later destroyed by fire, and in 1923 the congregation moved to its current location on Perry Street, just a few blocks east but strategically located a block from Duke’s East Campus.

During the 1960’s the textile industry was beginning to diminish, and under the leadership of Pastor Bob Henderson the church’s focus turned to reaching the students of nearby Duke University and to the concerns of the city as it faced the challenges of integration. The congregation began to be recognized as a distinctly evangelical congregation that welcomed students into their midst from all the local universities.