McCabe Memorial Church, also known as Iglesia Metodista Unida de La Playa de Ponce (Ponce Playa Methodist Church), is a historic church building in Barrio

Barrio

Barrio is a Spanish word meaning district or neighborhood.-Usage:In its formal usage in English, barrios are generally considered cohesive places, sharing, for example, a church and traditions such as feast days...

 Playa

Playa (Ponce)

La Playa de Ponce, Ponce Playa, La Playa, or simply Playa, is one of the thirty-one barrios that comprise the municipality of Ponce, Puerto Rico. Along with Bucaná, Canas, Vayas, and Capitanejo, Playa is one of the municipality's five coastal barrios...

 in Ponce, Puerto Rico

Ponce, Puerto Rico

Ponce is both a city and a municipality in the southern part of Puerto Rico. The city is the seat of the municipal government.The city of Ponce, the fourth most populated in Puerto Rico, and the most populated outside of the San Juan metropolitan area, is named for Juan Ponce de León y Loayza, the...

. It dates from 1908, and was designed by Antonin Nechodoma

Antonin Nechodoma

Antonin Nechodoma , was a Czech architect who practiced in Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic from 1905 to 1928. He is known for the introduction of the Prairie Style to the Caribbean and the integration of Arts and Crafts elements to his architecture...

. It was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places

National Register of Historic Places

The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

 in 2008. It is one of four places such listed in Barrio Playa, the others being the U.S. Customs House

U.S. Customs House (Ponce, Puerto Rico)

The U.S. Customs House , located at Bonaire and Aduana streets in barrio La Playa, Ponce, Puerto Rico, is the oldest customs house in Puerto Rico, and the only one of its type under the U.S. flag. As of February 10, 1988, the building was owned by the U.S. Customs Service, Washington, D.C. The...

, the Caja de Muertos Light

Caja de Muertos Light

Caja de Muertos Light, is an 1887 lighthouse in Ponce, Puerto Rico, that is unique amongst all other lighthouses in Puerto Rico for its unusual Lorraine cross, double-arm, T-type shape structure. The historic lighthouse is located in Caja de Muertos, an uninhabited island off the coast of Ponce,...

, and the Cardona Island Light

Cardona Island Light

Cardona Island Light is the only 6th order lighthouse in Puerto Rico with a cylindrical attached tower. The light is located on Cardona Island, a small island on the west side of the entrance to the harbor of Ponce, Puerto Rico. It was listed in the U.S...

.

Construction

The church is built in the Neo Gothic heritage. It has a concrete foundation and walls, and a wood and corrugated metal roof. Built in 1908, the church was built as a house of worship for the Methodist congregation in Playa de Ponce. The roof was originally built of wood shingles.

History

The church was built at this location because of the prominent commercial role that the Playa barrio played in the early ninetienth century. For this reason the La Playa barrio also had fisheries, schools, hospitals, a cemetery, and a population of 5,169 distributed through a residential area dominated by wooden houses. There was also a Catholic church, the Virgen del Carmen Catholic Church, built there in 1882. "The vital importance of the Port of Ponce explains why it was targeted as an early site for the missionary work of the new Protestant churches that came to Puerto Rico, immediately after the Spanish-American War

Spanish-American War

The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence...

 of 1898."

The church lot was acquired on March 31, 1906, after a donation of $400 by Bishop Charles McCabe Church construction began in 1907, and finished in 1908, at a final cost of $4,500. The locals christened the new church as La Iglesia Metodista de la Playa de Ponce (The Ponce Playa Methodist Church).

Through the years

In 1928 the San Felipe hurricane

1928 Okeechobee Hurricane

The Okeechobee hurricane, or San Felipe Segundo hurricane, was a deadly hurricane that struck the Leeward Islands, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, and Florida in September of the 1928 Atlantic hurricane season...

partly destroyed the church. It was quickly rebuilt by the locals, with the guidance of Catholic parrish priest Gonzalo Noel. Through the years, the locals, regarless of religious affiliation "have embraced the McCabe Methodist church as one of their icons". In 1946, the church inaugurated the McCabe Memorial School, and locals sent their children there regardless of religious orientation. The original facility was known as the Robinson Methodist School, but was later changed to Rev. Julia Torres School, in honor of a local teacher and religious leader. In 1960, Reverend Julia Torres, born in La Playa, became the first woman in Puerto Rico to be ordained as a Methodist minister. She directed both the church and the school for almost 12 years.

Significance

The McCabe Memorial Church embodies the wide historic process of the establishment of the protestant factions in Puerto Rico. In this respect, it defied the monopolistic control of the Catholic Church that had prevailed during the Spanish sovereignty over the Island. The church broke previous barriers as to the ideological separation of Church and State, when the opposite was the normal daily experience in Puerto Rican life. The church is also associated with an important icon of twentieth-century Puerto Rican architecture of the time, Antonin Nechodoma.

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