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NORTHFIELD HALL (1881
Kelvin Free Methodist Church) Copyright
2010-2020 by C. Barker, Published
in the Burford Times July 7th, 2010
2010
view of the Northfield Hall The
Free Methodist Church originated in New York State in 1860, when members of
the Methodist Episcopal Church split away from their church. The Free
Methodist Church is so named because they believed it was improper to charge
for better seats in pews closer to the pulpit. They also opposed slavery and
many of their churches were located at “check-points” along the underground
railway, which is one of the reasons they established churches here in Canada
during that time period. By 1880 there were over 300 members in
Canada and they held revival camp meetings throughout Ontario to gain more
membership. Many Camp meetings and revivals took place over the fall of 1880
and the winter of 1881 near Harley and Kelvin and the general feeling seemed
to be that this church group was encroaching into the other Methodist
church’s territory. Bitterness toward them was expressed through the local
papers and sarcasm was used saying that the Free Methodist members claimed to
be “free of sin.” Another bone of contention was that they advocated “freedom
from secret societies,” such as the Free Masons and other lodges, etc. During that time period, there were five
types of Methodist Churches, including Episcopal Methodist, Primitive
Methodist and Wesleyan Methodist. By 1884 there was a movement in the various
Methodist Churches to amalgamate to form one Methodist Church of Canada. It seemed that Kelvin was a haven for a
variety of churches in the early days, and at one time boasted about five
churches within about a mile and a half of the village, including the Church
of The Messiah, Congregational Church and Episcopal Methodist. The Free Methodist Church commenced
construction of their new building by way of a bee of the entire congregation
on April 30th, 1881. It was completed and consecrated on September 4th, 1881.
The Church was built just north of the village of Kelvin on the east side of
the Middle Townline on a property which was donated by Mr and Mrs Thomas
Hill. The church building was thirty feet wide by fifty feet long and a cemetery
was established on the same lot, which still exists.
(photo
2010 by D.A. Atkins) In 1963 after the free Methodist Church
closed at Kelvin, the building was moved to the south-east corner of the 12th
concession road and the Middle Townline and placed on a new concrete foundation
and renovated to become the Northfield Community Hall. Many community and
family events took place in that building including wedding receptions,
community dances, card parties and family reunions. In 2010, the Northfield
hall was closed and the local fire brigade used it for practice as it was
(control-burned) burned to the ground. Prior to its demise, some architectural
elements, such as the exterior clapboards, were salvaged by friends of
Westfield Heritage Village, Rockton volunteers, to be put to re-use in the
re-construction of another historic wood frame/timber constructed building
which was salvaged from the vicinity of Oakland and recently sent to the
Westfield Heritage theme park at Rockton to be reconstructed there. Much of
what was left, by way of furnishings etc, were sold to the public. It was very interesting to see the
various, nearly-extinct, species of woods which were utilized in the
building’s construction, and the enormous size of some of them. The sheathing
boards found on the interior side of the wall cavity were plenty wide with
some fetching nearly 24 inches in width and over an inch thick. Back in 1881,
there was an abundance of old-growth specimens of trees which are now nearly
extinct, such as Chestnut and Hemlock, Elm, fur and various types of pine
that are no longer found growing naturally in this part of the world. In
1881, a person from Kelvin wrote that Mr Paul Huffman had just cut plenty of
hemlock boards, some as wide as 48 inches!! The cemetery at Kelvin still exists
where the former Free Methodist Church once stood, and there is a commemorative
monument located there which was composed by Bruce Hill, consisting of a
bronze plaque fastened to actual stones from the original church foundation. Year after year, many families gathered
at the Northfield Hall for their annual family reunions; the Givens family
(my mother’s family) which settled in the Northfield area in the 1850s, used
to have their family reunions here too. While the elderly members of the
family were still alive, it didn’t make sense to them to have it anywhere
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