1301 Richland Street
City Directories and History: Located on the site of the first Lutheran church in Columbia, Ebenezer Lutheran Chapel was constructed in 1870 and extensively renovated in 1900. It was designed by Columbia architect Gustav Theodore Berg and remodeled by the Columbia
architectural firm of Wilson and Edwards. The church features a front façade in Flemish bond brick with glazed headers flanked by two square towers and finely detailed ca. 1900 art glass windows. Centered in the front façade is a large stained glass Palladian window. Brick pilasters with terra cotta capitals are featured on each corner of the front façade. The interior of the church is notable for its intricate pressed metal ceiling, its chancel area and organ platform which retains its turned balustrade. Alterations to the chapel have consisted of the removal of the pews and pulpit, and the removal of the balustrade and cupola which originally crowned each of the two towers. Located directly adjacent to the churchyard is a Lutheran cemetery which dates from the early 1800s. Listed in the National Register March 2, 1979. [Courtesy of the SC Dept. of Archives and History]
Click here to enjoy learning more about this site and the Columbia Hist. District, #2. The church cost a total of $160,000.
Ebenezer, Columbia—It is located at the comer of Sumter and Richland Streets, 1% miles north of the State capitol building. The congregation was formally organized in the fall of 1840 with 25 members, who took for themselves the name Ebenezer. During the next two decades (1840-1860) the growth of the congregation was slow and the work disheartening; the membership decreased to eleven and the pastor’s salary ranged from $98 to $134 per anum. Dark as was this period in the congregation’s life, a darker one was near, for on the night of February 17, 1865, Sherman’s army raided the city of Columbia and burned the church building. This was a knock-down blow to the little band of loyal Lutherans but it did not knock them out. They resolutely rose and set about to rebuild. Thus during the first half century of Ebenezer’s existence it had to struggle even to endure. But then a season of steady growth set in and has continued ever since, so that now it is among the largest Lutheran churches in the South with assets of more than a million dollars. Ebenezer, “Hitherto the Lord has helped us.”
(Information from: Names in South Carolina by C.H. Neuffer, Published by the S.C. Dept. of English, USC)
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IMAGE GALLERY of the Ebenezer Chapel via photographer Bill Segars – 2009