Hay Street United Methodist Church

Henry Evans, a free black, built the first Methodist meeting house on Cool Spring Street. The church purchased its current lot at the corner of Hay Street and Ray Avenue in April of 1832. The first building at this site was dedicated on June 23, 1835. It was replaced by the current structure in 1908, the centennial anniversary of the official organization of the church. The stained glass windows that surround the sanctuary were made in Salisbury, England, and feature the rare "Robing Glass" technique, a process in which the folds of the figures’ robes are actually blown into the glass. The creation of such "robing" is now a lost art. Bricks to build the current structure came from the brickyard of E.A. Poe, whose home is now known as the 1897 Poe House (part of the Museum of the Cape Fear Historical Complex). Mr. Poe served as the chairman of the Building Committee.