The First Fifty Years

A Look at the Past

Where Have We Worshiped?

In March 1951 a small band of Methodists met in the Recreation Hall (now the Los Alamos Little Theatre) in order to begin a church. In April of 1951 the church began meeting in the Home Economics room at the High School. (location 1) A few months later on September 9, 1951 one hundred seventy-nine people met at the Civic Auditorium (now the Duane Smith Auditorium) to charter the First Methodist Church of Los Alamos. Following that they Worshiped in the auditorium of Central School. (location 2) Central School was torn down a long time ago and the condominiums known as 2500 Central were built on that location.

Shortly after the charter was initiated, a letter was sent to the AEC (Atomic Energy Commission) requesting a building site “south of the football field”. In May of 1952 the church received a 5 year lease on that building site. After much discussion the Official Board (equivalent of our Church Council) elected in November of 1952 to rent and remodel the Dormitory T236 on Trinity Drive. (location 3) across Trinity from 35th Street. Dedication of the Dorm 236 as “House of God” and the new home of the First Methodist Church of Los Alamos occurred on December 7, 1952. This inaugurated nearly 5 years of work parties. Monday and Wednesday evenings as well as Saturdays were set aside as church work days.

In March of 1954 the Fourth Quarterly Conference resolved to borrow no more than $20,000 from the Board of Church Extension of the Methodist Episcopal Church South to cover the cost of buying, moving and remodeling the Dorm building and in August the church submitted the high bid of $357.77 for the purchase of the Dorm building. In September the lowest bid for moving the building to the Diamond Drive site was twice the estimate so work days were reestablished.
In October worship services were held in the Recreation Hall while the building was being moved. (location 4) Services resumed in the “new building” in May of 1955. It was with pride that the congregation moved into their own church home after having met in four different locations in their four year history. (see picture). Total cost for building purchase, moving and restoring was $30,480.57. In May of 1957 the lease on the property was renewed for 50 years.

Because of cramped church school classes and the necessity of having 2 services in order to accommodate all church attendees, it was decided to build a new sanctuary and in January of 1960 the Cilleson Brothers Contractors were selected to build the new sanctuary for $98,625 to be completed in July. Believe it or not, on August 21st of 1960 the Sacred Opening Services were held in the new sanctuary. James Sprouls, our organizing pastor, returned to preside at the first service and Bishop Angie Smith preached at the second service.

At the Official Board meeting the next day, Wayne Douglas, the current pastor, remarked: “Although the people of Los Alamos have been commenting on the fact that we have the ‘prettiest’ church, this is not what we should be striving for. Our task is to build God’s kingdom and our beautiful building is merely an avenue toward achieving this.”

A year later in August, the church celebrated its 10th Anniversary and broke ground for the Fellowship Hall. By December the hall was ready for a church wide Fellowship Dinner.
In May of 1967 we were able to purchase the church property from the Department of Housing and Urban Development for $6000.

During 1974 the church set its sights on an education wing for the church. In February we were also able to retire the debt on the sanctuary and in April the service of dedication for the sanctuary was held. At the April 28th meeting of the Charge Conference the working drawings for the new education building were approved and the contract was let for $257,048. Temporary partitions in the Fellowship Hall formed Sunday School rooms to be used while the new education building was in progress. Roger Waterman began removing the old Dorm building in July.

Ground breaking for the new education building occurred on August 4, 1974 and on August 28th the Lockwood Company began construction. We moved into the new building in May, 1975.
Since then we’ve had no major construction projects but in 1996 a committee formed to plan a major remodel of the existing kitchen in the Fellowship Hall. This became a reality and served us very well during the FOCUS meals era. It was also very helpful to feed fire survivors and fire clean-up workers after the Cerro Grande fire of 2000. It continues to serve us well as we prepare meals for many different occasions.

Then in 2004 the trustees recognized the need for replacing our roof which was nearly 50 years old. A bond issue was proposed and accepted to finance the new roof. Due to the passing years and the ongoing inflation rate, the replacement of the roof cost approximately 3 times the cost of the original building built in 1960.

We hope the new roof will serve us well for another 50 years.