Our History
50th Anniversary Photo Gallery
St. John's ... Growing & Thriving
In 2006 St. John's Episcopal Church on Carmel Road in Charlotte, North Carolina, celebrated the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the ministry of our church. St. John's has approximately 2,700 communicants and an average attendance of about 1,000 on any given Sunday at the three services. In the course of the fifty-year ministry of St. John's church we have developed a larger church facility with a redesigned sanctuary, new offices and meeting rooms, and the addition of a pipe organ and a columbarium. In addition, we have assisted in the development of a scout facility on the property, built a columbarium and a memorial garden along the south margin of the property, and playground facilities for our pre-school program.
St. John's community has developed as a result of the sacrifice, dedication, work, and devoted faith of our members over the past 50 years. To those persons, we today are eternally grateful, because we worship together and enjoy St. John's now as a community of Christians devoted to the growth of our church and ministry of Jesus Christ. It is, therefore, fitting at this time that we inquire how the St. John's community developed from 43 initial charter members and 52 initial communicants at the first St. John's service held on January 1, 1956. In early September 1955 four couples, strangers to each other until that time, pledged their financial support and their future spiritual dedication to the establishment and growth of the proposed new mission. The four couples were Kathleen and Pat Coffin of Christ Church, Jackie and Emmett Bryan of Holy Comforter, Marge and Bill Cole of St. Martin's Church, and Cassie and Bill Minor of St. Andrew's Church.
This group immediately set about the task of organizing the mission's congregation, visiting possible new members of the new church, and securing a place for the new mission to hold temporary services. They completed all arrangements by two weeks before Christmas of 1955 and scheduled the first worship service of the mission for January 1, 1956, at the school auditorium of the old Charlotte Country Day School on Sardis Road. Charter members and other worshippers gathered for the first service at 9:00 a.m. on Sunday, January 1, 1956. The Rt. Rev. Edwin A. Penick, the Bishop of the Diocese of North Carolina, celebrated Holy Communion. Since the mission did not have a vicar at that time, the Rev. W. H. Wheeler, a retired priest, and the Rev. Joseph L. Kellerman assisted from time to time in services at the new mission. When no priest was present, the services were read, including a sermon, by members of the mission, including Bill Cole and C. H. Touchberry.
Although the new mission accepted contributions from its sponsoring churches for the later construction of its permanent home, the mission was self-sustaining financially from its beginning, and growth was constant during that period. Pat Coffin served as warden for the new mission, until the mission became St. John's Episcopal Church in 1959. Kathleen Coffin became the first pianist and organist for the new mission and was its initial choir director. Charlotte Lett prepared the Sunday morning bulletins for the mission, and they were duplicated at Pat Coffin's office.
On October 1, 1956, the Reverend Martin Tilson from Anderson, South Carolina, was elected as priest-in-charge and vicar of the new mission. He conducted the first service in that capacity on October 7, 1956, with the Rev. Mr. Wheeler assisting. The groundbreaking for the new parish hall on Carmel Road occurred on November 2, 1958, with Kathleen Coffin playing the piano for the service in the midst of an undeveloped field. The mission applied for and was granted full parish status in 1959. The initial service was conducted in the new parish house on November 29, 1959, with the Right Rev. Richard H. Baker, the Bishop of the Diocese, conducting the service.
As a result of the organization of the church, new organizations came into existence, including junior and senior choirs, new guilds for the women, and the expansion of the young people's program. Plans were made for the gift to the church of a memorial garden in honor of Fred Young, one of the charter members of Christ Church and a member of St. John's and its choir. The memorial garden was commenced in the early 1960's with Charles Young and the Young family doing much of the work to establish the original plantings in the garden. The garden was dedicated on April 5, 1963.
As the ministry of the church continued to grow and expand, church leaders realized the church facilities were inadequate for the needs of the rapidly growing congregation. Thus in April 1960, they appointed a planning committee to investigate the expansion of the church. As a result of that initial effort, an expansion fund drive was begun in the fall of 1961. The financing on the existing parish hall was retired in 1964 and long-term financing was arranged for the expansion of the new church building and was begun in July of that year. The expansion included new Sunday school rooms and the sanctuary, and the new facility was completed and dedicated on September 21, 1965, by the Rt. Rev. Thomas Fraser, Jr., Bishop of North Carolina.
In the meantime, the ministries of the church continued to grow and expand. The Rev. Martin Tilson left St. John's as its rector in 1967, and Robert S. Hayden became the new rector of St. John's. Dot Glensor was appointed Director of Christian Education, and the first gift shop was opened during 1967. The funds derived from gift shop sales went to support needy children around the world. Robert S. Hayden left St. John's in 
1973, and Robert L. Haden became Rector of St. John's in December, 1973.
The first parish weekend at Kanuga was organized by Bob Haden for the last weekend of April 1974 and the Arts Ministry (TAMS) produced "Noah's Animals," the first of a series of plays. In 1981, a refugee family from Southeast Asia was “adopted” and supported by St. John's until they became self-sufficient and moved to another state.
In the early 1980's it became apparent that additional Sunday school space and office space was needed, and certain deficiencies in the existing facilities required urgent attention. At that time the narthex of the church was at Carmel Road end of the sanctuary with the altar at the opposite end of the church near the parking lot. The decision was made to "turn the church around," moving the Altar to the Carmel Road end of the church and designing new entries to the church from the parking lot. At the time a new columbarium was erected, a new organ was contributed as a part of the building program, and stained glass windows were purchased to replace the translucent windows.
Robert L. Haden left St. John's at the end of 1992, and the Reverend Charlie Riddle, an experienced retired priest, was selected to serve as interim rector until a new rector could be chosen and called. Mr. Riddle served as rector for two years and was very effective in holding the membership of the church together while the search for a new rector was completed.
The Reverend Martin (Marty) McCarthy of Epiphany Parish in southern Virginia was selected as rector and became rector in 1995. The church began a rapid expansion of its membership and its outreach program during the succeeding years. The amount of the budget allocated for outreach increased exponentially over the next few years, and special outreach programs were commenced, including Kanuga Kids and Habitat for Humanity. St. John's members assisted significantly in the establishment of the Trinity School and the Church of the Beloved and were also especially active in efforts beyond our community. They made trips to Costa Rica to assist in the development of church plant and program at Todos Los Santos Episcopal Church, trips to Haiti for work with the poor in developing church facilities there, and in 2006 trips to Mississippi for the purpose of assisting in clearing of destroyed homes and churches as a result of Hurricane Katrina.
It became apparent that the membership of the church had again outgrown its facilities. Church leaders decided that the church would undertake to build a new parish hall with associated offices, meeting rooms, church school classrooms, a chapel, and related facilities. Over the years the leadership of St. John's Church has been successful in attracting clergy and non-clerical staff that have been absolutely vital to the development of the programs of the church, including Associate Rectors Vic Frederickson, Ellen Hanckel, and Gale Cooper; Assistant Rectors Robert Williams, Paul Martin, and Clayton Townsend; Pastoral Assistant Terry Harris, and others including Beth Ely, Patricia Turk, Rachael Haynes, Lionel Gilmer and Ginny Herring.
In celebrating our 50th anniversary we are thankful for the generosity, the dedication, the prayerful faith, and the farsightedness of our vestry members, our church staff, our clergy and clerical staff for over fifty years. Without them, their help, their understanding, work, and cooperation, the development of the church and its many programs to this point in 2006 would not have been possible.
Worshiping and learning about God, fellowship and ministry with our neighbors, all are part of what makes St. John’s a thriving church, as we try to live out our mission as servants of Christ .
Photos from 50th Anniversary Committee
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Aerial shot of St. John's expanded campus
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Original St. John's Sanctuary under construction
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Services were held in the fields prior to construction
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St. John's in late 1950's - rural southpark
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