The Old Country Parson

Rev. William Cecil "W.C." Dunson (1901-1994)

 

 

In small communities where I grew up in West Virginia, the local minister often becomes an iconic symbol of leadership.  This stems back to the old days when for the most part church meetings were the pivotal activity of the week in many isolated communities, and in many cases, the local pastor was often also the most educated person who was looked up to in order to fill a number of roles besides just preaching, marrying, baptizing, and burying.  In many cases too, churches didn't have the luxury a lot of times of having a full-time minister, so in many cases the local preacher served a "circuit" of churches in the area that he visited on certain days of the month.  This was true of many denominations in the hills, in particular the Methodists, but also even Catholic priests had to serve their parishioners that way a lot of times.  The person I am about to talk about was a living testimony to those times, as he exemplified the classic mountain circuit-riding parson in his day.  

Rev. W.C. Dunson is a name that many people in eastern Preston County from a couple of generations back will know well - his name brings back a lot of fond memories to many of the older folks who did know him, and to this day he is still an integral part of the history of the area.  Rev. Dunson belonged to what was then called the Evangelical United Brethren denomination, and before I talk about him I feel a little history lesson is in order, as many reading this may not know much about this denominational tradition.  In around the year 1767, a revival meeting took place in a barn owned by one Isaac Long near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, under the spiritual direction of a Mennonite clergyman by the name of Martin Boehm (1725-1812) - it was at the time of the First Great Awakening when a revivalistic fervor was touching much of the nation then, including the Pennsylvania Germans.  Attending this meeting was a German Reformed pastor from Maryland, Rev. Phillip Otterbein (1726-1813) who had recently taken over the pastorate of the German Reformed Church in Lancaster.  Otterbein somehow received a dramatic spiritual awakening at the Isaac Long barn meetings, and at one of those services, according to an account recorded by Henry Spayth, Otterbein arose and embraced Boehm, uttering the classic proclamation, "Wir Sind Bruder!" which resulted in an outbreak of emotional joy in the meeting - this is historically credited with being the birth of the United Brethren movement, although it was not officially established until the early 1800's (Paul R. Fetters, Trials and Triumphs - History of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ {Huntington, IN: UB Dept of Church Services, 1984} p. 45).   The United Brethren movement later developed close ties, via its Great Awakening involvement, with the emerging Methodist movement, even adopting Wesleyan doctrine and spirituality from their Methodist peers.  The movement was also part of a larger German Christian movement in the US at the time called the "River Brethren," although a split happened early on which formed the Brethren In Christ, a Mennonite/Wesleyan denomination which in time identified closely with the Holiness movement.  Another group of Wesleyan-doctrine Mennonites in the 1800's called the Albright Brethren also were birthed out of the Great Awakening, and from them emerged a denomination in 1811 called the Evangelical Church.  As the United Brethren continued to grow, some issues began to arise, and one of the big issues led to a split in the movement in 1889 over the issue of membership in secret societies - the party that supported the inclusion of Freemasons into membership were called "New Constitutionalists," while the party that opposed participation in secret societies were called "Old Constitutionalists."  In time, the "Old Constitutionalist" party retained the name United Brethren in Christ, and are today still a separate denomination.  The "New Constitutionalists" though would undergo more evolution and in 1946 would merge with the Evangelical Church to form the Evangelical United Brethren Church (Behny and Ehler, A History of the Evangelical United Brethren Church {Nashville: Abingdon, 1979} p. 357).   Due to much common ground with the Methodists, in 1968 the EUB and the Methodist Church effected a merger that created what is today known as the United Methodist Church.  

That brief history lesson has significance for West Virginia for two reasons.  First, the Holiness/Wesleyan revivals found fertile ground in the West Virginia mountains.  Second, in the area of northeastern West Virginia, a large population of Germans settled, and many of them were members of the United Brethren Church almost from the beginning, as well as bringing in later a large number of non-German converts in the region.  In many cases, the United Brethren had a very ecumenical attitude toward other churches, in particular the Methodists (with whom they shared many doctrinal convictions), the Dunkards, and the Mennonites, as well as German Evangelicals of the Albright tradition.  My great-grandfather, Rev. Charles Judson Strahin, for instance was credentialed by both the Dunkards and the United Brethren back in the earlier part of the 20th century.  Many of the United Brethren in West Virginia chose to be part of the majority "New Constitution" faction after the 1889 schism, and later on many of them became EUB churches (and subsequentially United Methodist congregations).  My great-grandfather, as well as Rev. Dunson, were both part of that group.  It is at this point we pick up with Rev. Dunson's story.

William Cecil Dunson was born on March 27, 1901, near the community of Queens, in Upshur County, WV.  He met and married his wife Elva in 1920 in Oakland, MD.  Being as many preachers in those days were bi-vocational, the young Rev. Dunson and his schoolteacher bride supported themselves by his working at first a lumber store and later at the state hospital in Weston, WV, as an orderly.  After working a couple of other small jobs in the region, the young W.C. was called to the ministry and in the late 1920's he was licensed with the state United Brethren conference to minister a circuit of churches in Gilmore County.  It was in 1937 that the young minister accepted a call to the Terra Alta area, and he accepted the Terra Alta Circuit of churches which he pastored for many years while also supplementing his family income as a clerk for the Post Office until he retired in 1965.  He also served many of the local Dunkard churches as minister on several occasions during those years, and he was noted as being a caring, honest parson who got to know many of his flock personally.  (information taken from an old undated news clipping I had in my files from the local paper, The Preston County News, that commemorated the 48th anniversary of his ministry)

The old Pine Grove Church on Salt Lick near Terra Alta, WV, one of the EUB (later Methodist) congregations in Rev. Dunson's Terra Alta circuit.

 

My own personal experience with Rev. Dunson came much later, in the late 1980's.   By that time, Rev. Dunson had long retired full-time ministry, although at the request of many of his older flock he still conducted funerals and guest-preached on occasion.  He and his wife then were content with being members of Trinity United Methodist Church in Terra Alta, which at one time was a EUB congregation on Rev. Dunson's former circuit years previous.   I didn't get the chance to talk to Rev. Dunson a lot then, although a nonagenarian lady my mother took care of, Myrtle Masters, was one of his former parishioners and still really close with him, so he would come to the house to visit her on occasion.  What I did know of him though was that he was a very humble man, soft-spoken, but at the same time he had a reverence about him that drew people - to put it in religious terms, the Spirit of God was with this man in a way that you couldn't describe but just knew.     He was spoken highly of by many residents of Terra Alta, Rowlesburg, and the surrounding communities, and his reputation today is still a fascinating piece of the local history.  The church he chose to be part of upon his retirement, Trinity in Terra Alta, was founded in 1904 as a EUB church, and Rev. Dunson actually pastored it for several years starting in 1945 (History of the Trinity United Methodist Church, Terra Alta, p. 4).  Overall, Rev. Dunson's life is a rich legacy as well as an inspiring testimony of how God used a country parson to touch so many people, and his influence continues today.

Rev. Dunson passed away at the age of 92 in January 1994, roughly six years after his wife Elva predeceased him in 1988.  Although I never got the chance to know him as well as I would have liked, he still impacted me with his own testimony in a good way, and I only hope that the spiritual legacy I leave will be even a fraction of his.  Rest Eternal, Parson.

Reverend Mister Pansler

Rev. Clarence Snyder Pansler (1915-2000)

(photo courtesy of his granddaughter, Karen Pansler Lam)

 

I want to now just give a little glimpse of my early college years and first couple of years of marriage as I remember perhaps one of the most interesting individuals we had ever met.   I want to first of all give a little historical background as to our situation at the time, as God sent this dear man to us at a time we had a very real need, and that is why I wanted to dedicate a little something here to his memory in the best way I know how to do so.

When I originally started college fresh out of high school in 1989, I originally began studies at a little Baptist college in the panhandle of Florida.  However, an interesting thing happened on June 21, 1989 - I received the Pentecostal experience, tongues and all, at a little Pentecostal Holiness church in Brunswick, GA, during a revival that particular week.  Up until that point in my life, although I was raised fairly familiar with Pentecostal religious tradition in my family, I was a bit turned off by it due to my mother's gross misrepresentation of what a Pentecostal was.  By the grace of God though, I did receive Christ as my Savior on a chilly January night in 1986, and in subsequent years I threw myself into the Baptist Church full force - I preached, taught Sunday School, served on church council, etc. all before I was 18 years old!  But, curiosity got the best of me that summer before college when, while staying with my dad and working to earn some money, I began to get curious and warm up to the idea that maybe these Pentecostals had something good to offer, which led me to the Pentecostal Holiness church where I got myself filled with the Holy Spirit.  That experience rocked my world at a really pivotal time - I was about to start college at this Southern Baptist Bible school, and here I was beginning to do things like pray in tongues!  That, of course, eventually led me out of the Baptist Church for good and I began a long tenure as part of the Foursquare Gospel denomination.   

1991 dawned later, and that proved to be a somewhat chaotic year, as by New Years Day 1992 I was on a bus headed for California to attend LIFE Bible College, which was the official Foursquare school.  Things didn't quite work out, and as 1992 dawned life was a mess - I found myself back in Dothan, AL, without a dime to my name and being lodged with one of the church members in a small apartment just south of downtown.  Barbara and I were not married yet, I had an insurmountable amount of debt, and had to do something fast, so I went to culinary school for a few months, which also paid me a small stipend.  Barb and I eventually got married on May 22 of that year, and at around the same time I was accepted into Southeastern College in Lakeland, FL, and we made the move, leaving everything we could not load in our car behind as we bunked at my mother-in-law's house that summer (a word of advice to you newly-married young people - do not under any circumstances live with your in-laws after you are first married, as it can be testy!).  Any rate, I started at Southeastern that August, but my mother-in-law lived almost two hours north in Ocala and we had to commute - that just was not going to work!  So, we had to do something fast!

 

Fortunately, we found a place in south Lakeland that was owned by a rather stuck-up retired minister named Carrier, but again, we ran into trouble - we could only stay there a week, and then were asked to move based on mud on our car.  However, it was not necessarily bad news in that one of the first things I did when I started school in Lakeland was to look up the local Foursquare Church, and come to find out one had just started there on Lemon Street.   The church, Family Praise and Worship Church, was started by a former Assembly of God minister by the name of Gene Pansler, and upon explaining our situation to him, Gene put us in touch with his grandfather who just happened to own a nice little mobile home park within walking distance of Southeastern's campus.  His grandfather, of course, was Rev. Clarence Pansler, himself a retired Pentecostal evangelist.  Now, I want to tell a little about him.

Clarence Snyder Pansler was born in Ohio in 1915, and as he related his testimony to us upon first meeting him, he apparently led a pretty wild life in the late 1920's and early 1930's as he came of age - he was involved in bootlegging liquor and some other questionable enterprises, although he told us his folks were United Brethren church members.  He had a dramatic conversion - I believe he said he actually attended one of Aimee Semple MacPherson's tent meetings back then - and responded to a call to preach.  In makeshift trailers, he crisscrossed the country with his wife and young family, finally ending up settling in Florida.  His first wife, Blanche, later passed away in 1985 and he later remarried a sweet little lady by the name of Myrtle, who remained with him until dementia finally compelled her family to place her in assisted living.  Clarence and Blanche ended up having two children, Eugene Sr. (1933-2009) and Lois (still living), and it was Eugene who provided him with a host of grandkids and later great-grandkids.   Eugene Sr. later became the Vice President of Southeastern College, a post he held for many years, and many of his own seven children ended up serving the Lord in their own way as well - Gene, as mentioned, was at one time our pastor, and another son, Karl, is a prominent local attorney, while a sister, Karen, is an attorney in her own right and also has a strong apologetics writing ministry.  In short, Clarence has given his family a very rich and spiritually vibrant heritage.

 

Dr. C. Eugene Pansler (1933-2009), Rev. Pansler's oldest son

 

 

 

 I grew to love and respect Rev. Pansler, as he was a good landlord, a great spiritual leader, and a mentor to so many.  Unfortunately, at the time we first met him, he was already in his late 70's and began to have issues with the upkeep of the mobile home park he maintained for many years - he often called his park a ministry to the students, and at one time he even had a small tabernacle there where he held services and provided some of the Ministry majors from Southeastern a place to hone their preaching skills.  When we moved there though, the tabernacle was a storage shed, and the small guest quarters in back of it was rented to us as an apartment, which at $200 monthly was a good deal for 1992!  However, in early 1993, he sold the park to a Canadian retiree named Bill Oxford, and spent the remainder of his days at a small luxury apartment near the Wal-Mart on South Florida Avenue in Lakeland.  Nonetheless, we still saw much of him in the six years we lived in the place, and his daughter Lois was our ever-present neighbor across the street.  

Rev. Pansler had his own brand of wisdom that only an old-time Pentecostal preacher could get away with dispensing.  When we first moved into the park in August 1992, for instance, we got the chance to visit a lot with Rev. Pansler and his wife Myrtle, and he dispensed a little free marriage counseling to us that to this day I still can recall well - being we were only married for a couple of months at that time, he advised us thus - "If you ever have the temptation to cheat, just remember that all donuts have the same hole!"  A little crass to some more religious ears to be sure, but true nonetheless!  I also still have in my library a copy of Smith Wigglesworth's Ever Increasing Faith, which is considered a Pentecostal spiritual classic, that Rev. Pansler gave to all young ministers as his way of saying that an unwavering faith in God is necessary to carry out one's calling.  Recently, when meeting with his grandson Karl on business, we swapped some stories about Rev. Pansler, and one of the ones Karl shared with me came from his grandfather's twilight years.  Where Rev. Pansler lived at the Imperial Apartments off of South Florida Avenue is a large shopping center that included a Wal-Mart as well as several restaurants, including interesting enough a Hooter's.   For many reading this, no explanation of what Hooter's is noted for (besides its wings, of course!) is necessary, but for some reason Rev. Pansler would go up there during an occasion and have lunch.  Karl, a little shocked that his devout Pentecostal minister granddad would even step foot in a Hooter's, asked him, "Granddad, why are you going up to Hooter's?"   His grandfather replied, "Well, the wings are good, plus Jesus loves Hooter's girls too."  The "Hooter's Girls" got to know him pretty well, and it is said that he may have possibly even got a couple of them going to church again.  There are probably a myriad of these stories about this guy which could be told along these lines, but one thing is consistent - he was a man who knew his Lord, and served Him with sincerity and consistency for many years.  And, that was the man's spiritual legacy to his family.  

Rev. Clarence Pansler passed on to his eternal reward on April 22, 2000, just past his 85th birthday.  The park he once operated as a ministry has since passed into the hands of others, and nine years after his repose his son, Dr. Eugene Pansler Sr., joined him in eternity.  Both of them represented a rare breed of minister and Christian witness that sadly lacks this day and age, and hopefully some who had the privelege of knowing Rev. Pansler personally will be faithful to carry on his legacy.  I am also still fairly close with many of his grandkids, as many of them do live in the area still, and I know they too are blessed with the great legacy their grandfather gave them too.  In a way, I also inherited a small part of that legacy, as he was a man I looked up to as well, and there are thousands of people who could probably testify to the same.  Rest Eternal, Rev. Pansler, until we see you again when the time comes.

Little Churches

Well, here it is, 2014 already!  Boy, how time flies as you get older, and I feel like I am in a Star Trek-like warp drive now that I have reached the ripe old age of 44.  Some of those who are older than me may scoff at that, and I can hear those comments - "Aww, you're still a baby!" or "I wish I was 44 again!"  To be fair to my older friends, I will probably be making those same statements in a couple of years.   Any rate, I wanted to start this year off right with a couple of good thoughts.

Let's see...ever since I was a kid, I have loved church architecture.   There is something about a building that is designed to worship the sovereign God, and also the functionality of the church design is of interest to me personally.  However, I also love miniature things (except when it comes to saxophones, where bigger is better!) and inevitably the two penchants were bound to cross paths at some point.  Surprisingly, they did so practically on the back doorstep of where I grew up, as I remember as a kid this little tiny church that someone had built on US 219 South just outside of Parsons headed toward Elkins, adjacent to this large house that if I recall used to be an assisted living facility of some sort.  The little church did not have a name, and obviously no one carried on regular services in the little structure (who could fit into it, for one thing!)  but it served as a sort of holy place for local people who wanted to stop and pray, or just be close to God in their own way.  That mentality entails what we Appalachian-Americans would call "sense of place," which I recently dealt with in a theology article I submitted for an academic journal, and it also is the reason I write a lot of this stuff - "place" is more than just a geographic location, because for whatever reason it has sentimental value to the person who appreciates it, and it serves as a visible and tangible point of contact which connects to the deepest convictions of the person who appreciates it.  That little church outside Parsons back those many years ago did just that too.  As a kid, riding in Mom's car or with other relatives around town, I had passed that little church many times and in most cases never gave it too much thought other than something deep in my imagination stirring which for some reason made me appreciate it for my own unique reasons.  Let me share what the little church looked like back all those many years ago:

After several years of being away from my hometown, as I grew up several miles away in my early teens, I began to get a curiosity in my early adult years about whatever happened to that little church, as my grandfather now owns a house less than a mile south of where the little structure used to be.  I noticed on one occasion that it was no longer at the spot where it once was, and so I asked my grandfather about it.  He informed me that the little church was moved to Elkins, where it serves as a sort of meditation chapel in a garden of a local nursing home, but it is still very much around.  I was actually very happy the little chapel was preserved, because it was really too unique of a little landmark to just destroy.  Today, with some refurbishing, here is what she looks like:

Perhaps next visit home I may go see it for myself, as it would be nice to actually see the inside now too.

A few miles up the road is another tiny church, somewhat bigger than this one but still tiny, in the town of Silver Lake, WV, on US 219 North.  This one does have a name, as well as a story behind it, and it is called Our Lady of the Pines Chapel, the "Smallest Church in 48 States."  A popular local tourist attraction, the little chapel was built by a Lithuanian Catholic immigrant family many years ago as a sort of symbol of gratitude for the way God blessed them, and it has been kept up immaculately by the modern descendants of this family to this very day.  To access this little chapel, you go north on 219 past Thomas, and just shortly before the Maryland state line you will come into the small hamlet of Silver Lake.  If you watch for the signs, you will note them directing you to a small street that forks backward off 219, and if you take that narrow street back a little, you will come to the little church.  The doors to the little chapel are always open, and I understand that Masses are even held there, as well as weddings and other services (many people like having weddings in places like this, as it makes the experience extra memorable).  I have visited the chapel several times, and it is always a neat experience to do so.

Our Lady of the Pines Chapel, Silver Lake, WV

 

Altar area

 

The directional sign of the little church

 

As far as little churches go, it is not the smallest (despite the well-intentioned claim!) as there are many other tiny chapels that would make this one look like Notre Dame, but it is still definitely a tiny chapel that is worth your while to visit if you are in the immediate area.  However, I have visited one smaller in my youth, and now to tell you a little about that one.

 

Back when I was but 2 or 3 years old, as you may know, my parents divorced.  I of course spent most of my life in West Virginia with my mother, but I did get to visit Dad on occasion too, who lived in Brunswick, GA.  While in Brunswick, I had gotten to see a number of neat things  - the historic landmarks on St. Simons Island, the beautiful Atlantic beaches on Jekyll Island, and the pristine Okeefenokee Swamp a short distance away.   However, if one travels up US 17 heading north towards the town of Darien, there is a sign along the road which heralds "The Smallest Church in the US," and to get to it you have to turn right off US 17 and go out a short narrow palmetto and Spanish moss-draped sand road to it's location.  The little church is called Christ Chapel, and at only 10' x 15' it actually makes Our Lady of the Pines look huge!  Although built like an Anglican chapel, it is considered a nondenominational shrine for curious tourists as well as devout Christian motorists just needing a place to pray as they proceed on their travels.  And, like Our Lady of the Pines, I have visited this one many times over several years, and it is still fascinating to visit it even today, although at present it has been over 20 years since I had last been in that part of the country.  

Christ Chapel, off US 17 near Darien, GA

 

The interior and altar of Christ Chapel, Darien, GA

 

 

One of these days I will have to research into the full story behind this little chapel, as I have it somewhere in my memoirs but need to dig it up.  

 

There are other unique little churches I would like to visit but may not be able to for some time.  One of them is a tiny little church that a group of young teens put together in rural Virginia, and represents their love of the serpent-handling tradition.  The kids call the little church "Poor Valley Pentecostal Holiness Church," and from the outside it looks like a dilapidated outhouse although the kids have admittedly done a fantastic job making it look like a church.  It is even replete with its own "parishioner," a doll in Holiness dress they call "Sister" something.  The kids actually look like they are pretty devout, and even have a website for their little church at   https://sites.google.com/site/pvphc777/home that is worth a look.  

This is one photo of the little building called the Poor Valley Church

 

A side view of the little structure

 

This young fellow, Brandon Campbell, is listed as the "pastor" of the little church

 

A map actually has them listed near Rose Hill, VA, in a very remote area at the extreme western tail of the state near the Kentucky border.   I am not certain if these kids actually believe they have a real church (perhaps they do!) or if this is just a group of country pre-teens playing church - if it is the latter, there are worse things they could be doing, so to me they are pretty decent kids if they want to emulate churchfolk, so no harm done regardless.  It would be something neat to visit though and just talk with the kids about, because somehow they had good upbringing to undertake an endeavor like this, whatever their reasoning for it.  And, it looks like they believe in some ministry of some sort, as their website takes prayer requests too.  Any rate, they have gotten me curious about them, and I am interested in learning more about these remarkable young people.

I hope this lighthearted tour of small chapels I have either visited or have learned of over the years has been something you have enjoyed reading, and soon I will be back with some more reading material for you.  However, I may not be able to visit as often, as my graduate studies with Franciscan University, as well as church business and other things, have been keeping me pretty occupied the past few weeks.  However, although I may not be home here a lot, you are always welcome to visit my virtual "front porch," and feel free to do so.  God bless until next time.