Sam Willer and Agudath Achim

The Samuel and Sarah Willer Family, 1926. Seated, left to right: Rosa W. Gamm, Sarah and
Samuel Willer, and Goldye W. Watner. Standing, left: Ethel W. Eltis, Clara W. Groner, Lazarus
Willer, and Rachel W. Braunig.

Sam Willer’s naturalization documents reveal that he immigrated to the United States in 1885 from Russia-Poland. According to an interview with two of his grandchildren, Willer left his home country because he did not want to serve in the Russian Army. He left his wife and four children and set sail for America, where he would establish a new home for his family. With his uncle, B. Willer, living in Shreveport, it was logical for him to come here.

When Willer first arrived, he started out peddling goods, buying merchandise in Shreveport, and traveling into the rural areas of Caddo and Bossier selling his wares. After four years of living on separate continents, Willer was finally able to bring his family to live in their new home in Benton. He purchased land in Benton, built a home, and farmed the land, growing cotton, and raising cattle. And he also built and ran a general merchandise store, S. Willer & Son.

In Bossier, Willer is most famous for chartering a steamboat to fetch supplies for those stranded in Benton during the 1892 flooding of the Red River. But, he is also known in the Jewish community as having an instrumental role in the organization of the Agudath Achim Synagogue in Shreveport, which is still serving the local Jewish community today. While Bossier Parish had their fair share of Jewish residents, the overwhelming majority lived in Shreveport, which is why this part of Sam Willer’s story is on the other side of the river.

It all began when he joined a small group, comprised of five practicing Orthodox families in Shreveport, called Beth El. The significance of his joining the group is that he made it possible for them to form a minyan. A minyan is a quorum of ten men (or in some synagogues, men and women) over the age of 13 required for traditional Jewish public worship.

At the same time, there was another small Orthodox congregation in Shreveport by the name of Beth Joseph. These two groups realized that there is strength in numbers, and they joined together to form Agudath Achim in 1902. According to the Encyclopedia of Southern Jewish Communities, “In 1904, the congregation began construction of a new synagogue, but work was soon halted due to one of the outbreaks of yellow fever that frequently plagued the city. The strain of the epidemic posed a serious challenge to the new congregation’s synagogue construction project. At the height of the epidemic, trains were forbidden to enter or leave the city, and health officials fumigated every home in the town. The small community lost members, and those remaining lacked the funds to continue the synagogue construction project.”

“In this period of great trial, the citizens of Shreveport exemplified the spirit of solidarity and friendship that often arises from adversity. When news spread of Agudath Achim’s setbacks, Jews and Christians from across the city stepped forward to provide the needed funds. On September 8, 1905, much of the town crowded into Agudath Achim’s ‘magnificent edifice’ to participate in the new synagogue’s consecration service. Speakers included Agudath Achim’s Rabbi H. Wolenski and Shreveport Mayor Andrew Querbes. The crowd also included city council members, members of the Reform B’nai Zion Congregation, the Catholic chief of the Shreveport Fire Department, and many prominent local figures.”

Their first building was located at the corner of Fannin and McNeill Streets. As the congregation grew, they built a new synagogue in 1938 at Line Avenue and Margaret Place, which is now Rutherford House. In 1980, they built their third and current synagogue, which is on Village Green Drive in South Shreveport.

Before the formation of Agudath Achim, the members of Beth El pooled their monies together, and they purchased land for an orthodox Jewish cemetery located at Walnut and Yale Streets in the Allendale neighborhood of Shreveport. When the two groups formed Agudath Achim, the new combined congregation, which totaled 58 original members, assumed ownership of the Orthodox burial grounds, which became known as Agudath Achim Cemetery. Sam and Sarah Willer are buried there, along with other pioneering families of the area. 

By: Amy Robertson

The Highest Structure in the City in 1939

When entering Bossier City by way of the Texas Street bridge, and as you take the curve onto East Texas Street, you will see a beautiful three-story and basement, brick colonial building with white trim. The one with the maroon canopies adorning the stairs and entrances at the front of the building.

Photo By: Amy Robertson 04/30/2020

This eighty-year-old architectural gem of Bossier City is located at 329 East Texas Street at the corner of Third Street. It was built on lots that were donated to Ardis Memorial Baptist Church in 1903 by Dr. T. E. Schumpert, Col. R. G. Pleasant, and W. M. McCormick. However, during that time, the address was 325 Hunter Street.

Hunter Street became East Texas Street after a vote approving the name change took place during a Bossier City Council meeting on Mar. 7, 1933 which was presided over by Mayor Tom Hickman. During the time in which the Bossier side of the river was preparing the approach to the “new Red River bridge,” officially called the Long-Allen Bridge, perhaps better known as Texas Street Bridge. The decision to change Second Street East to Traffic Street was also voted on at that time.

In thirty years, the church had grown so much that the trustees began talks of building a new brick building. By 1934, the church announced in The Shreveport Times on Apr. 8, 1934, that a plan was accepted to construct “a $10,000 auditorium and later a $30,000 church plant to replace the frame structure occupied by the present frame structure.”

In 1935 Ardis Memorial Baptist Church was one of only three churches in the City, and in a newspaper article, that year, it was deemed “one of the big churches of the state.”

On May 11, 1937, another announcement appeared in The Shreveport Journal, stating that “A new $35,000 church will be erected by the congregation of Ardis Memorial Baptist Church in Bossier City.” Plans set in place in 1934 were finally beginning to materialize. At that time, the plans were for “The present auditorium and the present educational plant will be adjusted on the church property to make room for the new building.”

Designed by local architect, J. Chesire Peyton and constructed by contractor W. E. Keller, who was noted as having “built more Baptist churches in Louisiana than any other contractor” in the Apr. 3, 1938 issue of The Shreveport Times. Peyton and Keller designed and built the “highest structure in the city.”

Source: The Shreveport Times, April 2, 1939

It was completed on Feb. 1, 1939, by Ardis Memorial Baptist Church, which changed its name to First Baptist Bossier City and is the current home to Sunflower Missionary Baptist Church. The church held the dedication for the new building on Easter Sunday, Apr. 9, 1939.

In 1965 when the church decided to build a larger building down the road, the church property at 329 E. Texas St. was sold to the Twin Cities Missionary Baptist church. In the fall of 1967, the building went from Twin Cities Baptist Church to Faith Fellowship Baptist Church. In 1971 it went from being Faith Fellowship to Sunflower Missionary Baptist Church, which has occupied this beautiful brick colonial for fifty of the eighty years that it has existed (2021 marks their fiftieth year.)

Artis Memorial Baptist Church, C. 1903
Neil Yarborough Collection: 2006.034.004

The funds for the original framed structure were donated by Colonel C. H. Ardis, whom the church was initially named after. On the day the church was dedicated, J. Bryan Ardis read a letter from his father, Col. Ardis, which proclaimed, “This little church is donated to the trustees and all members who may join this church hereafter for all time to come and I trust the church will be ‘like a city set upon a hill, which cannot be hid,’ and that its influence for good will last as long as time lasts.”

I like to imagine that Col. Ardis would be proud to know what he and others began in 1903 has carried on through the test of time.

To see pictures of old churches and architectural buildings then visit our website, www.bossierlibrary.org, to access the Bossier Parish Libraries History Center’s Collections Database with over 10,000 various images and plenty of Bossier Parish History to keep you entertained. You can also follow us, @BPLHistoryCenter, on Facebook to see posts with great pictures of Bossier Parish History.

By: Amy Robertson

Red River Baptist Church: 170-Years of History

Red River Baptist Church's new sanctuary (left), old shale block building built 1947 (center), parsonage (right). Bossier Parish Library Collection: 2010.024.017

One hundred and seventy years ago on the “Saturday before the 4th Lord’s day in August 1849...” (August 25, 1849), Red River Baptist Church was organized at the request of thirteen men and women. The charter members were James Engram, J. G. & Caroline Curry, Dudley & Matilda Curry, Peter & Jane Curry, Adline Pouncy, William & Nancy Perrit, Selenor Romby, and Thomas & Louisa Hamilton.

They were led in the organization of the church by Reverend M. S. McDonal and Reverend Allen Winham from the outgrowth of the mission work of Caney Creek Baptist Church. Rev. Winham served as the pastor for the first fifteen and a half years (longest-serving pastor in the history of this church), except for a few months in which Rev. McDonal served as pastor.

During the nineteenth century, the church met only once a month, and on their next meeting, the newly formed church happily welcomed seven new members, including two slaves. In fact, the church minutes reveal that a large portion of the church’s membership was composed of slaves, who later formed a separate church.

It was recorded in the church minutes on the fifth Sunday in June of 1862 that the church met at Gold Point on the plantation of Wm. Pickett. On that day, the largest number of baptisms to occur in one day, in the history of the Red River Baptist Church, took place. According to the church minutes, Rev. Winham gave a sermon and afterward “a door was opened and invitation was given for the reception of members, when 48 presented themselves for baptism who being examined were received and baptized the same evening.” The names of all those baptized were recorded in the minutes as well.

All we know about the original meeting place is what’s described in the minutes of the organization of the church as “the meeting House in the neighborhood of ‘Willow Chute.’” Sometime around 1859 or 1860 the church moved to Wallace Springs or “Old Red River Cemetery,” located on the road to the Linton community. And, in the 1880s, services were held at the Pine Grove Schoolhouse.

It was November of 1901 when a majority vote was given to be built a permanent church house near Linton. A one-room frame building was erected in 1902 at the church’s current location and served as the church house until 1947 when the groundbreaking was announced for the construction of a new shale block building. The shale block building was a one-room structure that featured electric lights, ceiling fans, and butane gas heat.

Groundbreaking for new shale block church house, Linton Rd. 1947
Carol Young Collection: 1998.081.053

The 1950s was a time of rapid expansion for the church starting in 1951 when three Sunday school rooms were added onto the shale block building. Then, in 1952, a committee met to discuss building more Sunday School rooms, which resulted in a new building, that later became the parsonage. In 1955, the building committee agreed to finance the construction of a four-room Sunday School building. Finally, in 1957, the church approved the parsonage to be enlarged.

Ten years later, in the spring of 1967, a committee was formed to investigate the possibility of building a new Church building. But two years went by before plans were approved for a new sanctuary. On September 12, 1971, a dedication service was held for the new sanctuary, which was constructed with brick veneer, all-electric central air and heat, and was fully carpeted. Perhaps more importantly than the dedication service, the Red River Baptist Church celebrated their 122nd anniversary on August 29, 1971, in the new sanctuary.

In the fall of 1970, advertisements were placed in the newspaper for the shale block building to
be sold to someone willing to move the building. For some reason, the building was not sold, and
church records reveal that it was converted into classrooms and an assembly hall. On July 6,
1977, groundbreaking took place on a new educational wing built behind the sanctuary, which
was later added onto in the spring of 2000. On August 1978, the old shale block building was
torn down. A three-hundred seat sanctuary was added on around 2001 or 2002.

There have been two cemeteries established by the Red River Baptist Church, one at the
“Wallace Spring” location and one at Linton. The first cemetery at the “Wallace Spring” location
west of Cypress bayou on the Linton-Vanceville Road has been there for well over a century.
The second cemetery is located adjacent to the current church location and has been in use since
about 1904 and was expanded in 1958 or 1959.

During the last 170 years, Red River Baptist Church has “regularly sent messengers to various
districts states and-southwide [sic] Southern Baptist gatherings, and supported associational
missions, state missions, home missions, foreign missions, orphanages, Christian education and
benevolences of many kinds.”

All are welcome to join the 170th homecoming celebration on August 25, 2019, at 10:45 a.m.
with a fellowship meal afterward. It is located at 3301 E. Linton Road, Benton, La.

To learn more about the history of churches in Bossier Parish, visit the Bossier Parish Libraries
History Center at 2206 Beckett Street, Bossier City.

By: Amy Robertson