The Story of Woodlawn Baptist Church & My Mother’s First Wedding

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Two decades before I was born, my mother married her first husband here, Woodlawn Baptist Church. She knew it was a mistake, she said, but she was “lonesome” and her parents were always fighting. Church was an alternate world to school, where she felt shy and awkward. Now Woodlawn Baptist stands abandoned. The firefighters’ union is considering tearing it down. It almost made its 100th birthday before it closed.