- St Ann’s Bay Methodist Church was rebuilding after a February 2018 fire
- By October 2019, the new roof was on and sealed
- A restoration architect was engaged to keep the Georgian style
- The congregation had been worshipping in the church hall since the fire
Twenty months after fire tore through St Ann’s Bay Methodist Church, the building where Marcus Garvey worshipped as a boy was being put back together. The Gleaner reported in October 2019 that the roof was back on, and church officials hoped to have the sanctuary ready for use before the end of the year.
The church on Bravo Street in St Ann’s Bay dates to August 1, 1838, Emancipation Day. It has now burned twice. The first fire was in 1898, about 60 years after it was built, and the church was rebuilt then. The second, in February 2018, destroyed everything inside, including a pipe organ that was 110 years old.
Speaking after the 2018 fire, Bishop Everald Galbraith, then head of the Methodist Church, said: “It’s a loss, which is not only physical in terms of the building, but it’s also a loss in terms of the people’s sense of who they are because this church has meant so much to people. It will be rebuilt, but that sense of loss is great.”
By October 2019, the church’s district property manager told the Gleaner that the hardest part was done. “The roof is on and it’s actually sealed inside already. The building is fully covered and we’re now preparing to install windows and doors,” the manager said. The costliest part of the job, the reroofing, was finished. Ceiling work was underway, and windows, doors, flooring and pews were still to come. A restoration architect had been hired to keep the building’s Georgian look. The original roof sat on cut-stone walls, and the new design added steel beams while keeping the gabled shape. In the meantime, the congregation had been meeting in the church hall.
The article did not say what the rebuild cost or how it was paid for, including whether insurance covered any of it. For a building this old and this important, those are the questions that matter most to the people who have to pay the bills.
For Jamaica’s many churches housed in heritage buildings, St Ann’s Bay is a clear example of the ongoing cost of owning history. Rebuilding a listed Georgian structure properly means specialist architects, stronger materials and a lot of patience, and it happens while the congregation meets somewhere else. Diaspora members who feel attached to a home church can help most by supporting proper insurance and maintenance while the building still stands, not only by giving after a disaster.
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