Spartanburg County · Marker 42-36
Episcopal Church of the Epiphany
121 Ernest L. Collins Ave., Spartanburg
Front inscription
The Episcopal Church of the Epiphany was est. 1893 as a mission to Spartanburg’s African American residents. Rev. Theodore D. Bratton (1862-1944) organized the church as an affiliate of historically white Church of the Advent. The earliest members of Epiphany met downtown in a building on Wall St. The church founded a school in 1904. Its first settled pastor Rev. Samuel Whittemore Grice (1881-1940) began service in 1905.
Reverse inscription
The Church of the Epiphany moved to this site by 1912, when the current chapel was completed. S.C.’s bishop at the time called it “one of the most attractive and churchly buildings in the Diocese.” Its new location along what was then South Liberty Street was a common settling place for freed blacks after the Civil War. After urban renewal in the 1970s, this was one of the few historic structures left in the neighborhood.