Bethel Baptist Church in Houston

801 Andrews Street, Houston, Texas, Montrose 77019

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Located in one of Houston’s rougher, but rapidly improving neighborhoods still in the shadow of downtown, most people never saw this building because of the weeds that grew up around it. The church was on an abandoned yet stately on a street so dilapidated that the cobblestones were visible through beneath the decades-old asphalt. The people who have lived in this neighborhood all their lives sometimes sleep outside on the porch in summer because their clapboard shacks lack air conditioning which would merely seep out through the holes in the walls and roofs if they had it.

Once a place of worship, Bethel Baptist Church offered refuge to feral cats, flocks of birds, and the occasional junkie before being burned down in early 2005. Though entering was taking your life in your own hands, it was often admired from the outside. The church stood tall and proud offering surprisingly little sidewalk space for a building of its time. Much of the stained glass was in tact until the fire, though the roof was not.

Originally constructed near the Freedmantown district, established as a haven for former slaves. The fire came as the area was being redeveloped as town homes and fake loft buildings.

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