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HICKORY For 121 years the little chapel on a grassy hill in west Hickory has served the faithful in the town that grew up around it.
In 1887, the Rev. William Houk of Morganton held a 10-day tent revival at a schoolhouse. It was so popular it had to be moved to a hill nearby. The next year Houk's Chapel was built.
For 60 years the charismatic Houk, a Methodist who founded three churches in Burke County and three in Statesville, would preach here.
In 1929 the Methodist church discontinued the use of the chapel as a church, but Houk remained until he delivered his last sermon on Easter in 1947. He died in 1950 at age 95.
Hickory's industrial community grew up around the chapel. In 2003, the building was acquired by the Hickory Landmarks Society. Renovations began in 2006. There was little documentation to guide how the chapel looked, so the society had to do some detective work.
"We dug and we dug and we dug," said executive director Patrick Daily. "We traveled and pulled information out of people, so we have a pretty good idea we got it right."
When work began, the building was almost falling apart.
"When the bell rang, the entire building would shake," said carpenter Wayne Bowman, who is working on the restoration. The bell "weighs 800 pounds and swung in line with the center of the church. If we didn't fix the bell tower, the bell would have destroyed the building."
Bowman, painter Van Johnson and retired brick mason Jake Canipe have worked for three years bringing the church back from the brink.
