Six People Started It

Did you know? Jordan's 1913 history of the Juniata Valley says a congregation of only six members was organized at Mapleton in the early part of 1861 by the Rev. B. E. Collins, and that a brick house of worship went up the same year.

It was a Presbyterian church. Africa's 1883 county history also dates its organization and its building to 1861, and names John Donaldson, John Gayton and M. F. Campbell and their wives among the founding members. The church was brick, thirty two by forty feet, with seats for two hundred and fifty, and Collins was its pastor until 1872.

During the war, Jordan writes, the church made but little progress, but the six faithful members were like the leaven the woman hid in the meal, for the Mapleton church had been prosperous ever since the close of the war.

Mapleton's 1966 centennial history dates the formal organization later. It says the Presbyterian Church of Mapleton was organized on May 3, 1867, by Collins and Samuel T. Brown, a committee appointed by the Huntingdon Presbytery, and that Collins had already been preaching there for eight years. Its list of members at that time runs to thirteen names.

Checked 2026-10-30 · County histories and primary sources, read in full

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