A Chinatown institution will be marking 125 years of service and worship next month when the First Chinese Baptist Church celebrates its founding in October 1880, by Rev. Jesse B. Hartwell, a missionary recalled from his work in northern China. Hartwell first established the Chinese Baptist Mission with an English night school, renting tenement quarters on Washington Street that faced Portsmouth Square. A day school for children opened in another rented room on Jackson and Dupont Street, today’s Grant Avenue.
In 1973, the San Francisco Community College District provided credentialed teachers to teach English to community students in morning and evening classes. Today, the church oversees the site, coordinating evening classes, and tutoring and social programs for the students on Friday nights.
Hartwell solicited for his own salary, since there was no financial support from the American Baptist Home Mission Society. He toured the country, asking for help from American Baptist churches. Those were trying times as anti-Chinese sentiment and “antagonism by our own brethren” ran high. But members prevailed with an attitude that recognized “Providence in bringing a heathen nation to our doors.”
In 1886, Dr. Hartwell raised enough funds to purchase the lot where the church still stands today, on the corner of Waverly Place and Sacramento Street. A beautiful church with stained glass windows, oak paneling, oak pews, rich carpets and velvet curtains stood proudly in 1888, until it was completely destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire.
In 1908, the church was rebuilt. Today, FCBC thrives as a bilingual, bicultural church, providing both English and Chinese worship services and programs spanning the human life cycle such as Sunday school, senior citizen center, camps for children, sports leagues, hand bell choir, gospel choir and fellowship groups.
DETAILS: Weekend celebration, Oct. 8 125th birthday party, October 9 Worship Service at 10: 30 a.m., (415) 362-4139, www.fcbc-sf.org.
“In the 1930s the church Sunday school was mainly neighborhood kids. We had a rich life, active in YMCA, church clubs and Chinese School. I became the English-speaking pastor as that population grew. We even considered the idea that we wouldn’t need Chinese anymore, but in the 1960s a lot of new needs developed around a new wave of immigrants and we were heavily involved in poverty programs.”
– Dr. James Chuck, Pastor Emeritus, served as pastor for 40 years
“Every generation is different but our goal is to help the kids, to help them see how much God loves them. We are equipping younger ones to serve and lead.”
– Christine Otani, Christian Education Pastor
“Our work here is not finished. Our mission continues in Chinatown. And I want to be a part of that.”
– Pastor Don Ng, Senior Pastor
“I joined in the late 1950s. I’ve been doing church work since then. I live in the East Bay but I go every Sunday, because that’s where I’ve come from. I’m born and raised there.”
– Jimmy Lee, Parishioner
“I have been attending this church since I was child, when my mom dropped me off for nursery school, during WWII, when my mom queued up in Chinatown to buy groceries. My daughters still go, and my granddaughter just started to attend the nursery school.”
– Shirlene Tong Nakano, longtime church member