Kankakee Valley Post, Volume 19, Number 31, DeMotte, Jasper County, 1 July 1949 — The Story Of A Church Building Parson [ARTICLE]

The Story Of A Church Building Parson

J?eW*4th>rles G. Morse, Continues Ato*-'Churrh Builder In Literal Sense Despite His 70 Years The following is the story of the Rev. Charles G. Morse, builder of churches, spiritually as well as Jiterdlly, as told in the supplement section of last Sunday’s Indianapolis Star: Now past the age of 70, when most m<n who haven’t retired already at least are giving retiremint some serious thought, the Revj Charles G. Morse is building ijrhiA'ches. For this man. pastor of the Baptist Church at Noblesville, building churches means doing the actual work of constructiort', moving dirt, laying stone, harnmcfring and sawing. He .already has built nine cnutchos. Now he is working on the 110th and it will soon lie finished. How many more there will be depends upon how long he liveS.

The church which the Rev. Mr. Morse is building currently is at Wheatfield, a small town in Jasper ' County in the heart of an agriculfnral district. Artistically designt (1 and of stone construction the church will have a valuation., when completed, of an estimate! $100,000,. This remarkable self-imposed task vfrnt unnoticed, except of course by the communities which benefited from his work, during the years he spent in building the first nine churches. But recently he has gained nation-wide recognition. A national magazine pullished a story about him and a nationally broadcast radio program gave him an award. Of course these honors were Tiiccv And he appreciated them. But the real joy and thrill will come when the last stone is laid at the ’Wheatfield church and the building is dedicated. That is what he has been working for on his week-days. His Sundays he Spends preaching. He has his own church at Noblesville. And, as if that, al< ng with building churches, weren’t enbugh, he preaches at four other churches in small communities Denham. Roundlake, Miami, and Wheatfield. This modern circuit rider drives some 250 miles each Sunday and preaches four times. The Rev. Mr. Morse recalls that when he first visited Wheatfield there was no Sunday school and th< children had no religious education, except of course, what they received in their own homes. He decided the town ought to have a church. First be persuaded a church of anothei denomination to deed him a lot upon which an abandoned church had stood. He got it for sls, wl ich he paid from his own pocket. His ccond step was to haul his wheelbarrow to the vacant lot and begin digging a basement. ’'■For two days he spaded and wheeled dirt. Then a neighboring fanner drove past, saw the lone wm;k< i and offered the use of his team. T'b minister and the farmer wor'-t 1 four days. Then an-<••-he-r fmmer came by. This second < . v ' nteered the use of his tiavtoi. and he jojned tlje little w ik ’■ aadm Finally, came an- ' i . !. This was fire use of' -Smne 800 loads of d r’ v< i removed in digging the bav-mint. T'i< 1 > dp was purely voluntary. i Rev. Mr. Morse has ' \ i ;■ ■■• d for anv assistance. H ru <>ver a-ked for a cent of < •r.t , o • ■n< toward the church J. ~m. r. . But he has got both. “I start to work myself, find ?. I am working. God put< the ;d< t n the hearts of others ii *• Pt jm■.” ~ he sAvs. When the basement was completed tbe preacher-builder fast cned a trailer behind his auto-

mobile and drove around the community hunting stones. These were for the walls of the church. Sometimes he hauled stones a distance of 20 miles. Meanwhile he drove to a neighboring town and persuaded an organization to give him an abandoned church building to use for lumber, and he went to work tearing down the building and hauling the lumber in his trailer to the site of his new church. At Lansing, Michi, he found a wrecking company that had an excellent set of large colored glass windows which they would sell for SSO. He bought them. A church in Fort Wayne gave him some small windows they had discarded when rebuilding. And so it went. Almost every weekday last year the Rev. Mr. Morse was at work, gathering and setting stone. It is estimated that about 300 tons of rock already have been laid. An odd thing in the construction of the Wheatfield church is that the builder has elevated all the stone without the use of derricks. His method was to build a ramp completely around the building and to w’heel the stones to the places on the wall where they were needed He has used rocks of many shades and hues—black, white, gray and green. His blending of the various colors has been commended. Stones the Rev. Mr. Morse c«uld get; old lumber'he could get. But he faced another building problem. He lacked suitable lumber for the floors and the finishing, for the pulpit. But like all his other building problems, he got a solution. In this instance another nearby farmer helped out. The farmer heard about the Rev. Mr. Morse’s need for good lumber. He donated several excellent oak trees. Then came more help. A saw mill owner volunteered to saw the lumber. The Rev. M. Morse helped cut down the trees and haul them to the saw mill. The freshly cut lumber was dried and ready for Use this spring. The. Wheatfield church will have a beautiful quarter-saw-ed oak finish. When completed the Wheatfield church will be one of the more picturesque houses of worship in the state. And it will be a memorial to man who, though past 70 years old, thinks of the future in constructive terms of work still to-be done. So far as appearance is concerned, the Rev. Charles G. Morse of Sunday and the Rev. Charles (i. Morse of weekdays is certainly an entirely different man. In his pulpit he dresses formally, with pin striped trousers . and tailed coat—the conventional garb of the minister. But on week days, at his building job, he wears old, stained overalls, and his hair is disheveled as Jie rolls heavy stones or swings a sledge hammer or pushes his wheelbarrow. The nation-wide publicity which this church building Hoosier minister has received will have a ve,i.y direct effect on the Wheatfield church. It will make it possible for this church to be furnished with many interesting and unique articles from all parts of the world. One of the most unusual—and perhaps no other church in American will he able to duplicate it—will he t\Vo candle-sticks that for more than 10() years had been in a Buddhist temple in Japan. They are the gift of an American Army officer Rationed in a hospital in Japan. Rev. and Mrs. \\ . D. Archibald Observed their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary last Wednesday. .June 22. by taking a trip to Chicago. The morning was spent in visiting the., Adler Planetarium and at Lincoln Park. In the afternoon they shopped in Chicago loop. In the early evening they stopped at Jackson Park and enpvyed the lake from there.