A Brief History of the Bible Methodist Camp
Excerpt from 1988 Golden Anniversary Booklet

July 21, 1938 was an exciting day.  On this date the first service of the Pell City Bible Methodist Camp was held.  The "new camp ground" was located very near Highway 78 about four miles west of Pell City, Alabama.  Beulah Park, the old camp ground located in the western part of Birmingham, was no longer suitable and the temporary sites which replaced the old "Beulah" had proved unsatisfactory.  They needed a place for a new camp ground.

In the providence of the Lord such a site was near at hand.  Mr. and Mrs. C. D. Robertson of Pell City, Alabama learned of the need through their good friend the Rev. H. A. Johnson, the pastor of the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Pell City.  After much thought they determined to supply the need by deeding forty acres of timbered land to the trustees of the Alabama Conference of the Wesleyan Methodist Connection of Churches.

During the spring and early summer months men worked to develop the land.  A suitable spot was found for the first building.  It was a two story construction with a kitchen and dining hall occupying the first floor and dormitory spaces above.  No air conditioning! Straw ticks for mattresses! Apple crates for bed stands!  These were the things life was made of but it was a camp meeting!

The first service was held under a big tent owned by the conference.  Rev. William Smith preached the first sermon on a Thursday night.  Men and women with boys and girls listened as Aladdin lights hanging from post around the tent lightened the night.  Nights were often cool and rains frequent and sometimes heavy.  Occasionally the tent would sag under the weight of accumulated water and men would have to forcibly remove the water.  But these were handy folks and such inconvenience could never deter their love for truth as anointed from Heaven.

This was the beginning of what has come to be known as the Pell City Camp Meeting.  In those early days, people came from miles and felt life was not complete without "camp."  Mrs. Carrie Williams of Talladega, Alabama would bring her cow and graze it on the hillside.  She had no one to tend it at home and she must not miss camp meeting.

Now fifty years have passed since those simple beginnings.  Time has changed the overall picture of the grounds.   Faces once familiar have slipped away to Heaven and others have taken their places.  But amid the changes there has remained one thing that is the same - the consciousness of the presence of the Lord.  It is with great anticipation that we await His presence anew in this - our 50th Anniversary of the Pell City Bible Methodist Camp Meeting.

-- Excerpt from 1988 Golden Anniversary Booklet