Vancouver, Canada

First Baptist Church

On Sunday, June 6, 1886, a few months after Vancouver was incorporated as a city of almost 5,000, growing numbers led the group of believers to meet to organize a Sunday school with 25 to 30 children. The Sunday school met in a hall at the rear of Blair's Saloon on Abbott Street behind the former Woodward's store. The following Sunday, June 13, 1886, Blair's Hall and the city were destroyed by fire. On March 16, 1887, Reverend Robert Lennie, a Baptist missionary from New Westminster, called a meeting to move that the group unite to form First Baptist Church. Rev J.W. Daniels from Seattle, Washington, was the first pastor. On April 2, 1910, John Morton laid the cornerstone for the new church, and on June 9, 1911, the new building was dedicated. (June 12, 2014)