Five years ago I went down a rabbit hole. I started obsessing about the architect of McCarter Presbyterian Church, where I had served as music director for a number of years. I wrote about my research in a 2019 blog post about the Oeland Family and their involvement in the construction of multiple churches across the Upstate.
Fast forward a couple of years. Caroline Morris is the great-granddaughter of Paul Oeland, the head of the company that built the churches. She read the blog post and reached out to me to help with a project she was taking on. Her grandmother, Barbara Oeland Zoller, had been diagnosed with cancer, and Caroline was working on a video documenting the Oeland Family history, hoping to complete it to honor her grandmother.
I met with Caroline at McCarter and we did a video interview. This was shortly after things opened up after the pandemic. A couple of years passed and I kind of forgot about the interview and Caroline’s project. Then, back in May, I received an e-mail from Caroline that she had finally finished her project. The documentary was entitled “A Legacy of Faith” and she was planning to premier it at Lucas Avenue Baptist Church in Laurens in early June. The documentary would discuss the legacy of the Oeland family, but focus on three churches – McCarter Presbyterian, Lucas Avenue Baptist, and Victor Methodist Church in Greer. Caroline invited me to the premier showing.
So, the first Sunday in June I headed down to Laurens for the premier. Caroline didn’t know this, but I actually had a connection with Lucas Avenue, albeit somewhat tenuous. My family lived on Lucas Avenue when I was born. My father had been principal of the school down the street. My grandfather founded the Pentecostal Holiness church in the neighborhood across the street, and my great-grandfather worked in the textile mill across the street. When I walked into Lucas Avenue Baptist the first people I spotted after the pastor and the director were my cousin Melba and her husband, Charles. They were members of the church and now lived in the house that my great grandfather had built.
The event went well and I enjoyed the documentary. Caroline told me that she wanted to do more public showings before she posted it online. She also said that she was trying to set up a showing at my old church, McCarter.
Two weeks ago I got another e-mail from Caroline saying that she had been successful in setting up a showing at McCarter and that I was invited. I really wanted to go to it, but I came down with a bad summer head cold. After the showing, Caroline sent me a follow-up saying that the documentary had been posted to YouTube. So, without any more personal anecdotes or delays, here’s Caroline’s documentary, “A Legacy of Faith.”