Richland Methodist Episcopal Church

The Richland in the church's name was a Chicagoan's town. Milton M. Rich of Chicago founded it in 1861, the year the bronze has Rev. Ingham baptizing Minnesota Watson, reportedly dreaming of a city below the bluffs. He then quarreled with railroad officials over how the townsite would be divided, the dispute was never settled, and the line coming west from Le Mars, Iowa, was routed to Sioux City instead. Richland stayed small. The Census Bureau now counts it as a census-designated place of 5.64 square miles, home to 97 people in 2020.

What the plaque says

Richland Methodist Episcopal Church 1/4 mile Rev. S.W. Ingham, a traveling Missionary, in 1861 baptized Minnesota Watson, daughter of Thomas and Adeline Watson, who with A. J. Bell and wife were its earliest members in the Brule Creek community. The Indian War of the Outbreak in August 1862 drove the settlers away but they returned that fall and the church was reorganized by Rev. Ingham with Jason Payne as Pastor and about twenty-five members. The church prospered under various pastors until in 1885 W.H.H. Fate, J.L. Jordin, Albert Shurtliff, John R. Kerr and Frank Wade, obtained a church charter from Dakota Territory and it was May 12, 1885 when the trustees procured lots and the church was built by Gordon & Dean Blanchard and dedicated it as the First Methodist Episcopal Church of Richland on December 20, 1885. The present structure, with later modifications, still houses the Congregation. W.H.H. Fate played an important role in the continued church history. He was known as "Father in Israel". There have been many important people in the life of this church, but it was Fate who laid the corner- stone of its continuity. Located one-fourth mile south of S.D. Highway 50 it has, in 1967 over thirty active members, a firm reminder of the religious faith of the pioneer days. This church, a shrine of early Methodism, early frontier Christianity and rugged Christians after over 100 years maintains that role. Erected in 1967 by the members of the church and State Highway Commission

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Ponca State Park — 12 mi
  Oak ravines and bluffs at the downstream end of the Missouri's last unchannelized reach in Nebraska, with a three-state overlook and the river's resource and education center.
• National Music Museum — 14 mi
  One of the great collections of musical instruments in the world, on a college campus in a prairie town, built around a band teacher's thousands of horns, fiddles and curiosities.
• Spirit Mound Historic Prairie — 17 mi
  A lone hill north of Vermillion that Lewis and Clark walked to on a scorching day in 1804, now one of the few places left where you can stand exactly where they stood.

More markers nearby

• St. Paul Lutheran Church — 1.7 mi
• Giants in the Earth Country — 1.9 mi
• Elk Point — 5.4 mi
• First Election in Northwestern United States — 5.4 mi