{"nrhp_refnum":"03000197","name":"First African Baptist Church and Parsonage","other_names":["First Antioch Missionary Baptist Church"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"615 Knight St. and 407 Satilla Blvd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Waycross","county":"Ware County","state":"GA","lat":31.21013273400007,"lon":-82.34332965599998,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2003-04-11","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Black"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A Gothic Revival wood-frame church (built c. 1905) and a Queen Anne cottage parsonage (built c. 1910) at 615 Knight Street and 407 Satilla Boulevard in a traditionally African-American neighborhood southeast of downtown Waycross, Ware County, Georgia.","why_significant":"The church and parsonage are argued to be good, intact examples of popular architectural styles of their period, retaining original materials and floor plan. They also reflect the role of the Baptist church in the post-Civil War African-American community of Waycross. The congregation is considered the oldest African-American Baptist congregation in the area and the 'Mother Church' for later ones, and it gave rise to the first private school for Black students.","narrative":"A church and its parsonage stand together southeast of downtown Waycross, Georgia, in a historically African-American neighborhood. The wood-frame Gothic Revival church, built around 1905, has twin pyramidal-roofed towers, pointed-arch windows, beaded board wainscoting and a pressed tin ceiling. Behind it sits a one-story Queen Anne cottage parsonage, built around 1910, which keeps its original floor plan. The congregation began in 1870 as the Zion African Baptist Church, organized by recently freed people who first met in a log cabin. Its first pastor, Frank S. Hazzard, founded Hazzard Hill Baptist School in 1880, the first private school for Black students in Waycross and Ware County. A frame church built later was destroyed by a storm before the present building went up. The congregation is regarded as the area's oldest African-American Baptist group and the mother church for later congregations. The buildings are recognized for their architecture and for their place in local Black heritage.","period_of_significance":"1905-1953","architect_builder":"Unknown","architectural_style":"Mid-19th Century/Gothic Revival; Other/Queen Anne Cottage","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"The church is still used for services; the parsonage has recently been used for Sunday school rooms, meeting space and storage. The form says neither building has had many changes.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:43.431267-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_GA/03000197.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/03000197/5060881456-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/03000197/5060881456-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 4.0","author":"Bubba73 (Jud McCranie)","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:First_African_Baptist_Church,_side,_Waycross,_GA,_US.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Bubba73 (Jud McCranie)</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:First_African_Baptist_Church,_side,_Waycross,_GA,_US.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/93209855","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_African_Baptist_Church_and_Parsonage_(Waycross,_Georgia)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16891289"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/georgia/ware-county/first-african-baptist-church-and-parsonage-03000197/"}