chapter 1
Before the Roads Were Named — The Birth of Altare
The Consecration of Altare
Long before Newton–Calhoun Road carved its way through the red Mississippi clay, and before the Altare Missionary Baptist Church rose on its hilltop, there existed sounds. It was the sound of voices rising from beneath a “brush arbor”—a makeshift cathedral of oak limbs and faith, singing, “Lead me, guide me along the way. For if You lead me, I cannot stray.” This marked the birth of Altare. It was not a place found on a map, but a space conjured into being by families who understood that, in a world intent on keeping them landless and nameless, they would have to build an altar of their own. They didn’t just settle the land; they consecrated it.
The Architects of Kinship
The story of Altare does not begin with a founding date, but with the footsteps of newly freed people searching for two things: land and each other. Between the 1870s and 1890s, the community grew not by decree, but by the steady accumulation of kin. The community became a constellation of family names that served as the true boundaries of the region. Surnames were more than identifiers; they were anchors of survival.
- The Evanses, led by patriarchs like Pleasant, Peter, and Benjamin, became the social bedrock, their lineage interwoven into nearly every household.
- The Walkers, tracing back to Willis and Harriet, were among the earliest roots, claiming space when the dust of the Civil War had barely settled.
- The Chapmans, under the leadership of men like Dick and Denson, became the architects of the community’s future, understanding early on that land for a school was as sacred as land for a church.
- The Arringtons provided the spiritual and civic connective tissue, bringing ministry into a unified vision.
These families understood a hard truth: in Jim Crow Mississippi, a fence could be moved and a contract could be torn, but kinship was a fortress. By intermarrying and laboring on neighboring hollows, they turned individual farmsteads into a collective territory.
Naming the Sacred
The name “Altare” was not chosen by a developer; it was birthed by the pulpit. Derived from the word Altar, it captured the sacredness of their gatherings. For a people emerging from the darkness of bondage, the altar was the one place where they were not property, but children of God.
They drew their identity from Exodus 20:24: “An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me… In all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee.” In those early decades, the altar was made of earth. Before the first 1908 deed was signed, the “church” was the ground beneath the trees. This was a “hidden” community—invisible to the white newspapers and county census takers, but vibrant with the rhythm of midwives, sawyers, and farmers.
The Two Pillars: Church and School
By the turn of the century, Altare required a public face to match its private strength. Two institutions emerged to act as the spine of the community: Altare Missionary Baptist Church and the Altare Colored School.
The church was the heartbeat. It was the center for baptisms in winding creeks and revivals that lasted deep into the humid Mississippi nights. The charter members—men and women like Jessie Adkins, Berry Arrington, and Mary Watkins—were the “First Generation of Freedom.” Their membership was their first act of citizenship.
The school was the mind. When Louiser Evans and Denson Chapman donated an acre of land for the schoolhouse, they were committing an act of radical resistance. In a state that viewed Black literacy as a threat, Altare viewed it as liberation. This one-acre gift ensured that the children of Altare would not just work the clay but learn to master the world beyond it.
The Deed to the Hilltop: Formalizing the Faith
For decades, Altare existed in the hearts of its families and the shade of its trees. But by the dawn of the twentieth century, the “brush arbor” era—fragile and temporary—gave way to a desire for permanence. The families realized that to protect their legacy in a hostile world, their sacred ground needed the protection of the law.
The formalization of Altare Missionary Baptist Church required a crossing of racial and legal lines. On April 22, 1908, a significant step was taken when Robert Buchanan “R.B.” Lay and his wife, Annie Lay, executed a deed that would anchor the church to its hilltop. For the sum of fifteen dollars—a significant sacrifice for a community of laborers—the Lays deeded the land to the “Trustees of the Altare M.B. Colored Church.”
Unlike many documents of the time that centered on individual white landowners, this deed was a collective victory. It did not name specific individuals as grantors from the community; it recognized the Trustees as a body. This distinction is vital—it means the land didn’t belong to one man, but to the institution. It was the community’s first “corporate” act of ownership.
The Shield of Ownership
While neighbors like Thomas Watson were pillars of the community, individual landownership during this era was often precarious. Research into the crop-lien system reveals that even Black landowners with significant acreage often lived under the shadow of debt to local merchants and banks. To “own” land in 1908 Newton County was often a technicality; the crop was pledged before it was even planted.
Because individual land was so often “tied up” in these predatory systems, the 1908 deed from the Lays provided something rare: unencumbered sacred space. By securing the deed as a collective, the Trustees ensured that the ridge at what is now 244 Newton–Calhoun Road was protected from the debts or misfortunes of any single family. It was a fortress. With that piece of paper, the ridge was transformed from a quiet wood into a legal entity that the state had to recognize.
A Legacy Willed into Being
With the deed in hand, the community began the transition from the temporary to the eternal. The $15 paid to the Lays was an insurance policy for the soul. It meant that the structure they were about to build—and the graves they were already digging—could not be wiped away by a merchant’s lien or a surveyor’s whim.
The ridge became Altare’s sovereign ground. Every board nailed and every hymn sung was a reaffirmation of that 1908 contract. They were no longer “borrowing” the hilltop; they had bought it.
Altare was not carved by surveyors. It was willed into being by people who refused to be forgotten. Their names endure. Their legacy begins here.