Blaze Engulfs Cradle of Gospel Music in Chicago

Fire swept through the historic Pilgrim Baptist Church on Friday, sending flaming walls and timbers crashing into the grand sanctuary where gospel music was said to be born.

The building, a cornerstone of Chicago’s African American community and a landmark work of architect Louis H. Sullivan, was destroyed, fire officials said.

As the ruins steamed Friday evening, that loss had to be assessed from many angles.

A neighborhood had lost a church; worshippers a church home.

And American culture had lost the soaring hall where Thomas A. Dorsey, a jazz and blues artist who turned to church music during a period of personal grief, had developed a new musical idiom he called gospel.

The gospel songs, drawn from old spirituals and the jagged pain of the then-nascent blues, resonated with the community, drawing hundreds to the church, said Dorsey’s niece, Dr. Lena McLin, a composer and music teacher.

Among those who sang there were Mahalia Jackson and Sam Cooke.

Since 1922, Pilgrim Baptist had been housed in the building. “I can’t imagine another space comparable to it anywhere in the country,” Brian Goeken, deputy commissioner of the city’s Department of Planning and Development, said of the structure that was originally a synagogue when it was completed in 1891.

“It was a masterpiece and something like this can never be replaced,” Goeken said.

For others who gathered near the church as the fire raged, the loss was deeply personal.

“I’m devastated. I hate the loss of such a great structure,” said Valerie Miles, 53, a lifelong member of the church.

The fire broke out at about 3 p.m. and quickly grew to an extra-alarm blaze sending flames high into the sky. Smoke could be seen for miles.

The flames burned so hot that nearby parked cars caught fire and a melting copper roof cornice dangled like a strand of holiday tinsel.

The cause was under investigation, fire officials said. However, it appeared that the fire started on the roof where workers were making repairs.

“The roof was being worked on and the fire began on the roof,” said Fire Department spokesman Larry Langford. “That’s what we know.”

Four firefighters suffered minor injuries, Langford said.

About 60 students at the adjacent Loop Lab School had to be evacuated. The school, too, burned in the fire.

Langford said the church was “a total loss.”

Inside the building, history also burned.

Rows of murals painted by legendary African American artist William E. Scott are probably lost, said the Rev. Hycel Taylor, a former pastor at Pilgrim Baptist who has sought to restore the building.

Also believed destroyed were the church’s horseshoe-shaped oak balcony, the high ceiling curved into a half moon and an intricate panel of terracotta designs conceived by Sullivan that awed churchgoers and architecture buffs alike.

The church had long been a spiritual backbone of black Chicago.

Blacks arriving from the South between World War I and World War II found refuge at Pilgrim, with church leaders helping them to find homes and jobs nearby, said historian Timuel Black.