February 1, 1931The day of the fire. Members of the general committee discussed the possibility of relocating to West Hartford; remodeling the church building at its current site; and demolishing the remains of the current building and constructing a new building on the current site. Some members believed remodeling would be as expensive as demolition and building new.Read More | ||
February 2, 1931The general committee decided to take no action regarding future plans until they received an appraisal of the building’s condition. The first mention of merging with another church occurred at this time.Read More | ||
February 11, 1931The general committee accepted the insurance settlement offered. Although the amount of the settlement precluded building a new structure, the general committee postponed any action on the matter pending further study.Read More | ||
February 15, 1931The general committee decided to rebuild the church at its current location, as the insurance settlement would not cover the cost of a new building, either at the current location or at a new one. The plan was now to “remodel” the salvageable church building, with changes made to both the exterior and interior of the building.Read More | ||
March 9, 1931The building committee received and considered bids for rebuilding the church. The lowest bid was $70,000.Read More | ||
March 15, 1931The estimated cost of rebuilding the church had risen to $73,000, due to proposed changes to the original structure. At this point, a movement arose to re-consider moving to West Hartford as well as to review the potential cost of a new building.Read More | ||
March 16, 1931First Baptist Church of West Hartford formed a special committee to discuss a potential merger with the building committee of the Asylum Avenue Baptist Church. Subsequent reports indicated that informal conversations about the merger began shortly after this date. | ||
March 25, 1931The building committee decided it now needed to report on its informal discussions with the special committee of First Baptist Church of West Hartford.Read More | ||
March 29, 1931Asylum Avenue Baptist Church formally empowered a new committee to negotiate a possible merger with the First Baptist special committee. By this point, the new committee and the special committee had already compared the church’s separate memberships and charters.Read More | ||
April 1, 1931The proposed merger collapsed after one meeting between the building committee and the special committee.Read More | ||
April 9, 1931First Baptist Church of West Hartford held its annual meeting, at which it expressed its continuing desire for a merger with Asylum Avenue Baptist Church.Read More | ||
April 12, 1931Following regular Sunday services, members of the church briefly discussed the plans to rebuild the church, and both Frank Haggard and Lewis Robotham encouraged members to attend a special meeting, scheduled for tomorrow, on the work of the building committee.Read More | ||
April 13, 1931The members of the church formally approved the plan to rebuild the church. The Courant reported that this action ended the possibility of a merger with First Baptist Church of West Hartford.Read More |