‘Gold mine’ of church records uncovered
The history of the Congregational Church is the history of Colonial New England and an important part of religious history in North America.
Before the separation of church and state in the United States, the plain Congregational churches that date to the time of the Pilgrims and are found in every community in the region chronicled just about every aspect of life. Yet that history remains largely scattered and hidden, tucked away in damp, unexplored corners of church buildings from the coast to the mountains.
Now, with the help of a more than US$300,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Boston-based Congregational Library and Archives Hidden Histories project is locating, securing, and digitizing church records from 1630 to 1800 and putting them online for anyone to peruse for free.
Some records are already online, but the new grant will allow the project to digitize an additional 18,000 documents and transcribe about 7,000 of them, said James Cooper, director of the Hidden Histories project.
The church was the dominant religion in Colonial New England and the focal point of every community, Cooper said.
And because of that, the records contain more than just information about births, baptisms, marriages and deaths.
“Essentially, everyone was a Congregationalist at that time,” he said. “Almost anything that
Almost anything that happened in the community went through the doors of the church.
happened in the community went through the doors of the church. If two people had a squabble, you didn’t go to court, you went before the minister and tried to settle it.”
And fortunately, the ministers, often the town’s sole record keeper, wrote everything down. Often in meticulous detail.
“They provide an amazing insight into the lives and minds of ordinary folks,” Cooper said.
Cooper, a professor emeritus of history at Oklahoma State University, has spent almost three decades tracking down the records, often forgotten by modern day congregations.
He’s found them stuffed in pantries next to cans of tomato sauce; wedged into coat closets; and in a safe to which no one associated with the church had the combination. In one case, a church member put the records in a bank, and then died without telling anyone where they were.
“These records are an absolute gold mine,” Cooper said.