W.H. Sawtelle
Max Lueddemann
The following resolution was adopted by the church which I pastored thirty years:
Resolved, That Rev. W.E. Northcross, our pastor, is a good, moral, Christian man. He has been our pastor for thirty years, and we can truthfully say that he teaches in all things by example as well as by precept.
--TUSCUMBIA MISSIONARY BAPTIST CHURCH
The history of this church has undergone many changes, but they all worked for its betterment. At the close of the Civil war the few members went from brush arbor to brush arbor for three years. Then they held services in gin houses and under shelters for two years and six months. Then as the church was growing rapidly, they thought best to draw out, buy a lot, and build to themselves. So they bought a lot for what they paid fifty dollars ($50.) and erected a five hundred dollars ($500.) building thereon in which to worship the Lord. So the church continued to grow until it now has a membership of nine-hundred, a splendid brick edifice worth about six thousand dollars ($6,000.) and a thriving congregation. The church has never had but one pastor, and I have been as faithful as a clock. Through me (Rev. W.E. Northcross) the church was built, and I have ever since held high the Baptist doctrine throughout North Alabama.
[Wade Owens]
Interview with Wade Owens
—Preston Klein, Opelika, Alabama
WADE OWENS HEARD ABE LINCOLN SPEAK
The Reverend Wade Owens of Opelika was born in Loachapoka, Alabama, in 1863 and just missed slavery, but he has heard his homefolks talk so much about freeing the Negroes, he feels as if he was grown then. His mother and father, Wade and Hannah Owens, came from Virginia and moved into "Jenks Quarters" on the Berry Owens place. They had several children, Wade, Nettie, Chance, Anderson and Iowa. Wade used to help drive up the cows. This cabin was of logs, mud and sticks with leaf and mud chimneys and slab floors. The beds fitted into the wall with plank sides, two posts with planks nailed on top, resembling tables. A box served as a dresser.