The Indian Bottom Association of Old Regular Baptists--Trends In Membership Over The Last 80 Years

This blog post has been prompted by what I have observed over the last thirty or so years to be a steady, but slight, decrease in the numbers of both members and member churches of the various associations of churches which refer to themselves as "Old Regular Baptist".  My mother was a member of the Steele's Creek Church of the Old Regular Baptists from some time about 1950 until her death in 1970.  Since her death and the death of the long term moderator of that church, E. Hawk Moore, along with other members and regular attendees at that church, there was a steady decrease in members until finally the church was dissolved by the New Salem Association of which it was a member church and the church property was sold to a private owner who now leases the building to a private corporation which uses it as a day treatment center for the mentally ill or mentally disabled.  Quite fortuitously, I was able to meet that owner and he graciously gave me the sign from the front of the church which had never been removed at the time the church was dissolved.  Let me state for the record that the Steele's Creek Church was not a member of the Indian Bottom Association and I know of no connection between that church and the Indian Bottom Association other than the possibility that some minister who might have been connected to the Steele's Creek Church could have been a delegate to the Indian Bottom Association meeting at some time since several associations which refer to themselves as Old Regular Baptist do have some form of limited fellowship between associations and often send delegates to the association meetings of corresponding associations.  I should also note for the record that I am not and have never been a member of any Old Regular Baptist Church and I should never be confused with the Old Regular Baptist preacher Roger Hicks.  I am simply interested in their history, as I am in nearly every other aspect of the history of Central and Southern Appalachia, since they were a part of my family's life and I have known of them all my life.  

Among the many associations in Central and Southern Appalachia which refer to themselves as Old Regular Baptists are The New Salem Association, The Northern New Salem Association, The Burning Springs Association (1813), Red Bird Association (1823), Mountain Association (1856), Red River Association (1876) The Mud River Association (1888), Twin Creek Association, Spencer Association (1898), Sandy Creek Association, Washington Association, Three Forks of Powell Valley Association, The Philadelphia Association, Ketocton Association, Yadkin, Holston, Kehukee and Roaring River. Associations. This list is likely to be somewhat incomplete and I would recommend anyone who is interested in learning more about the Old Regular Baptist churches and their numerous independent associations to read Howard Dorgan's excellent, but somewhat aged, book "The Old Regular Baptists of Central Appalachia: Brothers and Sisters in Hope".  Any attempt to study all of the various associations is a complex and time consuming effort and I suspect that is a major factor in the fact that so few academic books have been published about any of these associations.  Thankfully, the Old Regular Baptists have historically produced an annual report of vital statistics, obituaries, and circular letters which is the best source of information about any particular association. These annual reports are referred to as the "Minutes" of each particular association and have always been a rarity among the majority of small Appalachian churches most of which maintain very few written records.  But the major drawback to that route of research is that no central depository exists for the Minutes of all the associations.  The University of Pikeville has the best collection I know of but even that one is markedly incomplete.  Thankfully, the Indian Bottom Association made a decision with the advent of the internet to place all their "Minutes" online.  I would have loved this writing to have been able to compare membership and total church numbers for at least two or three associations over the same time period but I do not have adequate access to a sufficient number of Minutes over such an extended period of time.  For that reason, this blog post can only effectively examine the membership trends in the Indian Bottom Association.  But it is likely that the other associations will have had similar trends in membership and church numbers to the Indian Bottom Association. 

I will be comparing total membership numbers and total church numbers in the Indian Bottom Association from 1939 to 2019 in ten year increments since it would be a task of book length to compare those numbers year by  year for even fifty years.  I want to begin in a year prior to World War II for two reasons, firstly, because that war changed the face of much of rural America since it sent hundreds of thousands of rural men, and quite a few women in supportive services, to Europe and Asia and exposed them to a vastly different world than the one in which they grew up.  Secondly, I would like to be able to make an educated conclusion as to whether or not a sizeable number of those young Appalachian men and women who returned alive from World War II had been affected by the war in a manner which would have caused them to have what are commonly called "salvation experiences" and to join the churches of their parents after their return.  

In 1939, there were 27 documented churches in the Indian Bottom Association which had recorded a total of 1328 members.   Three churches had more than 100 members with two more having membership in the high 90's.  The largest church was the Big Cowan Church with 138 members.  Big Cowan Church was located in Whitesburg in Letcher County Kentucky.  Carr's Fork and Poor Fork were the other two churches with 100 or more member at that time.  Carr's Fork was located on Carr Creek in Knott County Kentucky and Poor Fork was located near Cumberland, Kentucky, in Harlan County. 

When we go to the 1949 "Minutes", we see that there were then 30 churches in the Indian Bottom Association which represents an increase of 3 member churches over the ten year period which is an 11% increase over the 1939 statistics.  The total membership in those 30 churches was 1634 which represents a sizeable increase of 306 members which is an increase of slightly more than 23% in total membership in the association over the ten year period following World War II.  There is no available way to determine how many of those 306 new members might have been returning veterans but it is likely that a significant number of them were such men and perhaps a few women who were also veterans of some war related service such as nursing, hospital work, or office work at established military bases.  There were then, in 1949, five churches in the association which had more than 100 members each with the Big Cowan Church remaining the largest with 167 members.  That reflects an increase of 29 members in the Big Cowan Church which is slightly more than a 21% increase in membership over the ten year period.  Poor Fork, Oven Fork, Big Cowan, Doty Creek, and Little Home were the five churches with at least 100 members.  Carr's Fork had dropped out of the list of churches with at least 100 members and was down to 95.  Big Cowan still led the numbers with the aforestated 167 members, an increase of 29 members over the ten year period which represented an increase of 21% in membership. 

In the 1959 "Minutes", we find that total membership in the association had dropped to 1377 members which is a significant decrease over the ten year period and is very close to the numbers at the beginning of this research in 1939.  The total loss in membership is 257 members for a percentage of 15.7% over that  ten year period from 1949 to 1959.  The total number of churches in 1959 remained stable at 30.  

The 1969 "Minutes" showed a total membership of 785 members which is very significant drop in membership from 1959 when the total was 1377 members.  The total membership loss was 592 members for a 42.9% drop in membership which would be shocking in any respected institution in a stable community.  The Statistical Table only shows a total of 21 churches in the association which seems to indicate that 9 of the member churches had chosen to leave the association over the preceding ten years.  The most logical reason for such a departure in members and member churches would be that there had been some major dispute of doctrine which led the 9 churches and most of their members to leave the association.  It is also significant that no church in the association reported having a hundred members.  The largest was now New Home Church with 82 members.  A handful of the churches were now reporting less than 20 members.  

The 1979 "Minutes", as entered into the internet website does not contain a Statistical Table page which appears to be an error of some sort since no association of which I have ever known failed to include the Statistical Table in their annual "Minutes".  Because of that error, I have chosen to revert for this time period to the 1978 "Minutes" which will make this period of examination 9 years instead of 10.  For the next reporting period, I will revert back to what would have been the normal year to examine, 1989,which will make that period of examination 11 years.  The 1978 "Minutes" shows 916 total members which is a significant increase over the 785 members reported 9 years before in 1969. That represents a 16.6% increase in total membership over the 9 year period.  But the 1979 "Minutes" shows only 20 member churches which represents a loss of 1 member church during that 9 year period.  The usual reasons still hold true for the loss of a member church and would usually be due to either a loss of membership which caused a church to be dissolved or that the missing church left the association to either become an independent church or to join another Old Regular Baptist Association.  It is most likely that a church's departure with active members would have been due to doctrinal disputes.  It should also be noted that the church structure in Old Regular Baptist churches does not utilize a system of pastors or paid ministers of any kind.  Each church has a Moderator, Assistant  Moderator, and Church Clerk.  The Moderator is not a complete example of a "pastor" and that word would never be used in an ORB church.  The Moderator is responsible for running the monthly weekend of meetings, supervising care of the building, preaching or at least "opening" the services but does not function in a truly "pastoral" capacity. 

The 1989 "Minutes" shows a total of 1323 members and a total of 26 churches which is a significant increase in both membership and member churches.   That is a total of 407 new members over the 11 year period and an increase of 6 member churches.  The percentage of increase in membership is 44.4%.  The 5 new churches represents an increase in member churches of 25 percent.  I suspect that some of those member churches arose out of the Great Migration of Appalachian mountain people who moved to the industrial north to work and took their particular form of religion with them.  The church clerks list shows one in Ohio and one in Indiana which has been a common theme with the New Salem Association also and actually brought about the creation of the Northern New Salem Association in Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, and one or two other industrial Midwestern states.  But  I also suspect there could be other sociological reasons for such an increase in both the church members and the member churches.  Once again, I have arrived at a question which cannot be completely answered in the time I have to devote to this research and it is exacerbated by the lack of comparative data from the other associations.  

The 1999 "Minutes" reports a total membership of 1893 total members and a total of 42 member churches.  Both these increases over the 10 year period are remarkable.  They could be due to further movement of members and their families to the industrial north but that is unlikely.  It seems to me that the more likely answer would be that another small association may have disbanded and those churches decided to join the Indian Bottom.  An increase of 16 new churches in such a small association over that time period is unlikely.  The 16 churches represent a 61% increase in member churches.  The total increase in members is 570 members which represents a 43% increase in total membership and the total membership in the association had doubled over the previous 20 years.  That is truly astounding and it shatters my original supposition that the association would have had significant losses in membership over the time period.  

The 2009 "Minutes" reported 1876 total members is virtually identical to the 1893 members 10 years before.  The drop in membership of only 17 members in a total population of nearly 2,000 is statistically insignificant at .00898%.  A total of 47 member churches were reported in 2009 which indicates that average membership per individual church is dropping.  The new churches, 5 in total, represent an increase of 11.9% in total churches.  Although I had not been computing average membership in the churches over the entire examination, let's look at that for this two reports.  In 1999, the average membership per single church was slightly more than 45 members.  In 2009, the average membership per single church was down to 39 average members a drop of 6 members per congregation which represents a drop of 13.3% per individual congregation.  

The 2019 "Minutes" only two  years ago reported total membership in the association of 1595 members for a drop in membership of 281 members which represents a drop in membership of 14,9% and is also significantly less than it was 20 years before.  There are only 43 total member churches reported in 2019 for a drop of 4 member churches which is a drop of 8.5%.  The total average membership per local congregation has also dropped to 37members which is another drop of 2 members per congregation.  While everything I suspected to learn by examining these membership data in the Indian Bottom Association did not hold true, I did learn the total membership in the congregation had a significant increase in membership following World War II which was followed by a slow decline in membership which was temporarily reversed in the ten years between 1989 and 1999.  I still suspect that sizeable increase was probably due to other churches and their entire congregations deciding to join the association.  But after that increase, the next 20 years shows a reversion to the slow, steady decrease in membership while at the same time showing an increase in member churches which is offset by a drop in total average membership per congregation.  I am too overloaded with other projects to attempt a full year by year analysis of the numbers.  But it would be very educational to see some good statistician and researcher do that very project with a book in mind about that and other aspects of the various associations of Old Regular Baptist churches.  Howard Dorgan's excellent book was published 20 years ago and a follow up is long overdue.