Faith,

from p. 11

shop across the street.

A Free Will Baptist Congregation held services for a time in the Methodist church every other Sunday and a Union Sunday School there each Sunday. The Robinsons, Damons, Kennedys and Williams were members. Rev. W. D. Dennett was one of the first pastors in 1879. Rev. and Mrs. Dennett were parents of Dr. Tyler Dennett, born in Spencer June 13, 1883. He was president of Williams College, Williamstown, Mass., and advisor to President Woodrow Wilson during World War I. In 1924 he was appointed chief of the Division of Publications of the State Department of the Federal Government, resigning in 1931 to become a professor of international law at Princeton University. In 1933, Dennett won the Pulitzer prize for his biography, “The Life of John Hay.”

Hope Chapel Hope Chapel, a little country church located north and west of Spencer and sometimes referred to as the Church in the Vale, was built sometime in the 1890s by a group of Methodists who had previously held their services in the Schofield School, later called the Groveside School. Mrs. Sarah Pickett and Mrs. Ellen Parrette were instrumental in raising funds for the building. Men of the congregation and other friends helped with the labor.

This was a small but active, close-knit, happy group, with a fine Sunday School, a thriving Ladies Aid Society and, at one time, a Hope Chapel Band, directed by a musician from Riplinger. Their pastors and ministers were from either the Spencer or Unity Methodist churches. Church families began to move away and were replaced by families of other denominations until, finally, the few remaining families decided to disband and unite with neighboring Methodist churches.

Consequently, in 1948, the building was sold and torn down.

Cross Fire Church Cross Fire Church, an Assemblies of God church, was established in Spencer in 2023 as a church plant from Bluff View Church in Arpin. The church meets at 212 S. Pacific St., in the space that used to be a Mexican restaurant next to The Village Market. The first service was held on July 30, 2023.

Patrick Langreck, who lives between Spencer and Marshfield, serves as pastor of the church, assisted by his wife, Vicki.

The church meets Sunday mornings with contemporary worship and Biblical teaching along with a children’s church ministry. The congregation consists of 35-40 people.

Ministries include small groups discovering the Scriptures and practical needs of daily living. One such group is “Losing What Is Precious,” meant to help those suffering a loss of some type (loved one, relationships, finances, health need, job loss, etc.), held on Tuesday evenings. The church also offers men’s breakfasts, sharing testimonies the first Saturday of every month. Women’s meetings are held once a month at varying times for fellowship, studying of the Word and testimonies.

The church will sponsor “old-fashioned family fun games and activities” for children, teens and people of all ages for the Spencer sesquicentennial.

The Spencer Methodist Episcopal Church, which was built in 1895, was located on the corner of Main and Pacific streets. It was later the home of a Mennonite congregation after a new church was built for the Methodist congregation in 1969-1970. The church stood until 1986 when the State of Wisconsin bought the church from the Mennonites and tore it down as part of its highway improvement project.

CONTRIBUTED PHOTO