Starlight Missionary Baptist Church

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Starlight Missionary Baptist Church was organized in September 1928 by a group of sixty-two baptized believers in Christ, who were former members of McKinley Avenue Baptist Church. The group organized Starlight at the then Charlton-Pollard High School and elected Reverend S. Sheppard to serve as pastor in an old, L-shaped store front on the corner of Brevis at Finis Street and later in a brush-harbor on Wallace Street. During Reverend Sheppard's administration, a tabernacle was built on the newly-acquired property on the corner of Buford and Port Streets. Reverend J. T. Stewart was called to pastor Starlight in 1935 and led the church through many improvements. In 1942, the tabernacle was replaced by a frame structure. During Rev. Stewart's thirteen years of leadership, the church secured furnishings, musical instruments, two lots and two houses in the 500 block of Buford Street. Reverend William Nelson McCarty, Sr., accepted Starlight's call for service in December 1948 and began plans for re-organizing ministries, including the order of worship, and the church's future expansion. Membership exploded and new ministries were introduced and flourished. In 1985, The Family Institute was introduced, featuring student tutorials, a reading program, grooming classes, thrifty financing, educational games and climaxed with a Family Fellowship brunch. In 1955, an adjacent lot facing Buford was purchased. Having vacated its frame structure seven months earlier for remodeling, Starlight dedicated its renovated, brick- veneer sanctuary on April 12, 1958. A few years later, a house and a lot, adjacent to the church on Port Street, were purchased. This remodeled house was used as a temporary classroom building until it was demolished to provide space for an attached, U-shaped, brick-veneer educational building (dedicated on December 12, 1965 ) adapted to nine self-contained departments of the revitalized Sunday school. The mortgage for each of these additions was retired immediately after purchased.