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Mission & HistoryBethlehem Centers of Nashville promotes self-reliance and positive life choices for children, youth and adults in Middle Tennessee by delivering and advocating quality programs and services. Historical Chronology of Bethlehem Centers of Nashville - 1894-2006
The Wesley Community House, started by the City Mission Board in 1901, provided educational and recreational programs and services for the disadvantaged and is currently located in South Nashville. Officials at Wesley House developed the J.C. Napier Center in 1956 to serve the African American community. Centenary Center, formally known as the Warioto Settlement House and the Centenary Methodist Institute, was started in 1908 by the young Methodist women from the Methodist Training School. The center provided programs and activities for white, predominantly rural migrant workers from North Nashville. The programs focused on teaching domestic skills such as cooking, sewing, disease prevention, and learning the newest childcare techniques. In 1907, Sallie Hill Sawyer, and African American, approached the women from the Methodist Training School in Nashville, and urged them to extend their services to Nashville impoverished African Americans. A graduate of Fisk University, Sawyer was a former teacher and a member of Capers Memorial Colored Methodist Church. Estelle Haskins of the Missionary Training School joined Sawyer to start a kindergarten, well-baby clinic, sewing circle, and recreation program for African Americans in the basement of St. Andrews Presbyterian Church in 1913 and one year later, with funds from the Tennessee Conference Woman's Missionary Society, a building for Bethlehem Center was built at Tenth and Cedar streets. A year later, the center moved to Eighth and Cedar Streets and later became the headquarters for all "colored workers" of the Red Cross during the First World War.
In the past 116 years, Wesley House, Centenary Center, and Bethlehem Center have evolved into one multi-service agency now known as Bethlehem Centers of Nashville (BCN) with facilities in North, South, and downtown Nashville, and Camp Dogwood in Cheatham County. Bethlehem Centers is governed by a Board of Directors consisting of community and business leaders and has expanded its mission to reach all poverty-restricted infants and young children, teens, young adults, adult women, and senior citizens in the neighborhoods surrounding the Bethlehem Centers.
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Mission & History |
Founded in 1894, the United Methodist Neighborhood Centers were dedicated to young mothers and their children. Their goal was to touch the lives of 30,000 immigrant and poverty-level Blacks in the City of Nashville. Throughout the years three centers were formed and later combined to provide a variety of programs and services for the Nashville Community.
The center was moved to its present location at 1417 Charlotte Avenue in 1923, and in 1929 forty-three acres of land were purchased in Cheatham County and given to the center. Camp Dogwood was built on that land and served as the first location in Middle Tennessee for African American youngsters to attend camp.
