Trinity United Methodist Church, Orangeburg

Dating from 1866, Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church was built where the Orangeburg County Courthouse now stands. The present structure on Boulevard was begun in 1928 and completed in 1944. Materials portraying the original church are available and can be viewed by visitors. Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, constructed over a 16-year period from 1928 to 1944, is an excellent example of 20th-century Gothic Revival church architecture. It was designed by William K. Wilkins (1881-1937), a professor of manual training and industrial education and teacher-trainer of shop work at South Carolina State College from 1918 until his death in 1937. Wilkins, who was educated at Claflin College, South Carolina State, and the Carnegie Institute of Technology, never held an architect’s license, but designed buildings under the supervision of Miller F. Whittaker, director of the mechanical arts department at South Carolina State. This is the fourth building associated with the Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church congregation, which was organized in 1866 by Methodist ministers from the North. Although a groundbreaking ceremony was held for the present sanctuary in 1928, construction of Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church proceeded slowly as the church found itself in the Depression. The first services in the completed building were held in August 1944. Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church played a central role during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s as the site of numerous organizational and strategic meetings. Sources: NRHP, SCDAHhttps://digitalcommons.wofford.edu/umcschistoric/1143/thumbnail.jp