Carrboro Baptist Church (Century Center)

In the chronology

1. about 1901 Thomas F. Lloyd gives a church lot facing his mill to Chapel Hill's four congregations Lloyd offered a Weaver Street lot to the Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Baptists and Methodists of Chapel Hill. The first two gave up their rights, and the Baptists and Methodists built Union Chapel on it in 1901 or 1902, a frame building about twenty by thirty feet.
2. October 30, 1902 Baptists organize Union Chapel in West End On land Thomas Lloyd deeded for churches, Baptists and Methodists shared a small Weaver Street building on alternate Sundays, and the Baptists organized as Union Chapel with seventeen charter members; the congregation became Venable Baptist in 1911 and Carrboro Baptist in 1914. People: Thomas F. Lloyd (Carrboro mill builder)
3. 1912 Union Baptist Church becomes Venable Baptist Church Once the Methodists stopped meeting there around 1910, the chapel was known as Union Baptist Church. In 1912 the congregation took the name of the newly incorporated town of Venable.
4. 1914 Venable Baptist Church becomes Carrboro Baptist Church In 1914, the year after the town was renamed for Julian S. Carr, the Baptist congregation changed its name again, to Carrboro Baptist Church.
5. 1921 Toney and William Strayhorn begin Carrboro Baptist's brick church When the Rev. J. B. Davis called for full-time services, the Baptists traded their lot for a larger Durham Hosiery lot on North Greensboro Street and hired the Strayhorns, who laid the foundation and ground-floor walls in 1921. Money ran short and work stopped until 1924, a break visible in two shades of brick.
6. 1924 Carrboro Baptist Church completes its brick church at Greensboro and Main The mill-town congregation borrowed $50,000 to build a brick church at the corner of Greensboro and Main streets, paying off the debt in 1942; the building is now the Town's Century Center.
7. about 1924 Union Chapel is taken down and its materials go into McDuffie Baptist Church Once the brick Carrboro Baptist Church was finished, the old frame chapel was dismantled and its materials used to build a church on N.C. 86 north of Chapel Hill, named for early Carrboro Baptist minister McDuffie.
8. October 1963 to 1964 Carrboro Baptist Church remodels its sanctuary Work on an extensive remodeling of the sanctuary began after the first Sunday in October 1963, alongside a new educational building. By September 1964 the renovation was finished and the church invited the community to see the new facilities.
9. June 17, 1997 Carrboro aldermen vote to buy the Carrboro Baptist Church property After months of talks, the Board of Aldermen voted 5 to 2 to buy the church at Greensboro and Main streets, with room for the police and recreation departments. The town remade it as the Century Center, with the sanctuary as a hall seating about 250.
10. August 30, 2004 The Carrboro Cybrary opens in the Century Center The Cybrary, a branch of the Orange County Public Library focused on computer and Internet access, opened in Room 5 of the Carrboro Century Center with five computer stations, current books and a paperback exchange. The Town of Carrboro provided the space. It closed on January 31, 2025, when its services moved to the Southern Branch Library.

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