Morris Memorial Building

In 1915 Nashville Baptists helped split the convention that Morris led. Convention leaders held that the National Baptist Publishing Board, run in Nashville by Richard H. Boyd, belonged to the denomination; Boyd said it was independent. When leaders tried to take control, Boyd and most Tennessee Black Baptists walked out of the meeting hall and formed a rival body with the same name. Court fights and failed mediation followed, and two conventions, both based in Nashville, outlived Boyd and Morris, who died in the early 1920s.

What the plaque says

Morris Memorial Building / Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. Pi Sigma Chapter (Nashville Alumnae) Morris Memorial Building. The Morris Memorial Building is named for the Rev. Elijah Camp Morris (1855-1922), who served as the first President of the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc. from 1895 to 1922. At the time, the National Baptist Convention was considered one of the largest African American religious bodies. Designed by McKissack & McKissack, one of the nation's first African American architectural firms, in the mid-1920s, the Morris Memorial Building housed the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc. Sunday School Publishing Board, McKissack & McKissack Architectural Firm, and other African American businesses. The Neoclassical building, listed in the National Register of Historic Places since January 1985, is the only building still standing associated with African-American businesses in the downtown area. Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. Nashville Alumnae Chapter (Pi Sigma chapter). Pi Sigma Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority was chartered at the Morris Memorial Building in April 1930. Charter members, all graduates of Fisk University, were Mary Katherine Battle. Eloise Lowe Clark, Melissa Elliott, Grace Price Goins, Minerva Hatcher Johnson Hawkins, Bennie Bell McClendon, Edwina Randall Wilson. A year later, the Pi Sigma Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority hosted the Sorority's Eleventh Annual National Convention in Nashville from December 27 through December 31, 1931. This was the first convention held in the South by Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. Pi Sigma was renamed Nashville Alumnae Chapter in 1958.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Tennessee State Capitol — steps away
  William Strickland's Greek Revival capitol on Nashville's Capitol Hill, finished in 1859 and built from the bottom up with the labor of enslaved men.
• Civil Rights Room at the Nashville Public Library — 0.3 mi
  A room in the downtown library with a circular lunch counter, a timeline and oral histories of the 1960 Nashville sit-ins, a few blocks from the stores where they began.
• Ryman Auditorium — 0.4 mi
  The 1892 brick tabernacle in downtown Nashville that was the Grand Ole Opry's home from 1943 to 1974, now a National Historic Landmark and working concert hall.
• National Museum of African American Music — 0.5 mi
  A downtown Nashville museum, opened in 2021, tracing gospel, blues, jazz, rhythm and blues and hip-hop through Black history from 1619 to 2016.

More markers nearby

• Nashville Inn — steps away
• Tennessee State Capitol — steps away
• First Masonic Hall — 0.3 mi
• Maxwell House Hotel — 0.3 mi