TY - JOUR
AU1 - Slatter,, Ruth
AB - Abstract This article uses archival references to maintenance and repair to approach nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Wesleyan chapels and their material contents as ‘becoming’ things. Reflecting on the material changes that made the maintenance or repair of Wesleyan chapels necessary, or occurred because of these processes, it considers what maintenance and repair reveal about everyday practices and experiences within these communities. This article’s approach allows it to draw conclusions about individuals’ personal and mundane engagements with Wesleyanism in London during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As such, it overcomes some of the problems that historians interested in the everyday have traditionally faced as a result of the shortage of surviving personal testimonies about the everyday nature of church attendance during this period. Using Wesleyan chapels from London’s northern suburbs and East End as case studies, this article particularly focuses on the repair and maintenance of organs and chapel interiors. It uses these examples to reflect on the practicalities of everyday life in Wesleyan communities, demonstrating how considering moments of repair and maintenance highlights the (sometimes fraught) interrelationships between the spiritual, social, and practical priorities of Wesleyan communities. Introduction In 1851, a new Wesleyan Methodist chapel was opened on Stoke Newington High Street in north London [1], [2]. The second Wesleyan chapel to be constructed on the same site in thirty years, the new chapel was larger and grander than its predecessor which had been a rectangular brick building fronted by simple classical columns. Conforming to contemporary fashions expounded in F. J. Jobson’s architectural treatise Chapel and School Architecture published in 1850, the chapel was built in the gothic style considered suitable for spaces of religious worship and its larger size was an explicit response to Stoke Newington’s growing suburban population.1 Many architectural historians have discussed buildings’ style and size as a reflection of religious communities’ theological beliefs and evangelical aims.2 However, by shifting attention from the Stoke Newington Methodist Chapel’s initial moment of construction to its subsequent material development, this article will highlight how studying buildings’ structure and contents can also reveal alternative stories about its religious communities’ everyday practices. Fig 1. Open in new tabDownload slide Exterior of Stoke Newington Methodist Chapel, built 1851. © Stoke Newington High Street Church—images reproduced with permission. Fig 1. Open in new tabDownload slide Exterior of Stoke Newington Methodist Chapel, built 1851. © Stoke Newington High Street Church—images reproduced with permission. Fig 2. Open in new tabDownload slide Interior of Stoke Newington Methodist Chapel, built 1851. © Stoke Newington High Street Church—images reproduced with permission. Fig 2. Open in new tabDownload slide Interior of Stoke Newington Methodist Chapel, built 1851. © Stoke Newington High Street Church—images reproduced with permission. In particular, throughout the chapel’s archives, there are continual references to acts of repair and maintenance that either altered the chapel’s material fabric and contents or responded to gradual and sudden changes to the chapel’s structure and material assemblage. For example, in November 1881, vandals caused (unspecified) damage to the chapel’s back wall. As a result, its trustees—an appointed body of men responsible for the chapel building’s use and maintenance—employed Tyssen Architects Esq. to repair the chapel’s external structure and erect a new periphery wall at the chapel’s rear to prevent further damage.3 Similarly, in 1924, when vandals once again marred the chapel by throwing stones through its stained glass windows, the chapel’s trustees not only paid for the damaged windows to be fixed, but also purchased wire protectors so that the windows did not become the victim of future violent acts.4 These moments of maintenance and repair are illustrative of broader processes of material change within the Stoke Newington Chapel and, by diverting attention from motivations for the chapel’s initial design, speak to its everyday uses. Most specifically, these examples suggest tensions between the chapel’s financial situation and theological perspectives. In both instances, the trustees did not simply repair damage caused to their chapel, but also added a protective layer; a wall or wire mesh that shielded the building from further harm. Implementing these extra-material precautions had significant financial implications for Stoke Newington Chapel's trustees. While they appreciated the benefits of mitigating the detrimental financial consequences of continual repair, they also explicitly noted that the wire protectors should only be ‘fitted outside the windows, if not too expensive’, highlighting the financial pressures the community felt.5 Both the wall and mesh also had theological implications. While they protected the chapel from further material harm, they also segregated the chapel from its suburban environment, symbolically creating a barrier which undermined the building’s openness and its ability to act as an evangelical tool in the conversion of Stoke Newington’s ‘unchurched’ community.6 Indeed, the actions that resulted in these moments of maintenance and repair illustrate how this space was perceived by members of the local community, highlighting a lack of reverence for its spiritual character and little concern about enacting acts of vandalism. Therefore, consideration of the maintenance and repair undertaken at Stoke Newington Chapel suggests this community was finding it difficult to implement their evangelical aims. These opening examples are illustrative of this article’s methodology and how, by engaging with design historical, anthropological,and geographical debates, it will use the material alteration of Wesleyan chapels to contribute to growing scholarly considerations of everyday experiences of spaces of faith.7 Beginning with archival references to maintenance and repair within London’s Wesleyan chapels, it will identify moments and processes of material change within these spaces and use them to gain insights into the everyday experiences and practices of the religious communities who used these spaces. Specifically, it will focus on the maintenance and repair of organs and chapel interiors, processes commonly referenced in chapels’ minute books. These examples will provide insights into Wesleyan communities’ everyday practices and will illustrate how they were a negotiation of—sometimes fraught—interrelationships between Wesleyan communities’ spiritual, social, and practical priorities. London’s Wesleyan Methodists 1851–1932 Wesleyan Methodism was one of many nineteenth-century branches of the Methodist movement. Initially founded by the Anglican clergyman John Wesley as part of the early eighteenth-century Church of England, the Methodists gained their name in response to their methodical approach to spiritual disciplines, such as prayer, studying the Bible, worship, and fasting.8 After Wesley’s death in 1791, the Methodist movement separated from the Church of England to became an independent denomination and during the nineteenth century split into various factions in response to political and theological differences. The Wesleyan Church considered itself the original and most authentic Methodist denomination. However, as the nineteenth century progressed, Wesleyans increasingly pursued established Church status, dispensed with much of early Methodism’s revivalist spirit, and placed increasing importance on a hierarchical structure led by ordained ministers.9 The fundamentals of Wesleyan theology largely conformed to the beliefs held by the wider Methodist community. They believed that Jesus was the son of God and that by dying on the cross he had atoned for all humanity’s sins and given them the gift of salvation. Therefore, assured that redemption was available through faith alone, they believed that anyone who proclaimed to believe in Jesus was saved. Wesleyans expressed these beliefs through three fundamental and equally prioritized practices—divine worship, Wesleyan fellowship and evangelism—resulting in congregants combining social, political, and charitable activities with sung worship, Bible study, and prayer.10 As a result, this article’s reflections on everyday Wesleyan practices in London’s chapels will consider the particular ways in which Wesleyans (often simultaneously) engaged in worship, fellowship, and evangelism, alongside the practicalities of material maintenance. In contrast to the broadly Methodist nature of Wesleyan theology, the Wesleyan Church had a particularly structured and hierarchical organization framework.11 At the top of this hierarchy was the Conference, the Church’s supreme legislative body, which met once a year and was responsible for overseeing the Church’s life and doctrine across the nation.12 Below the Conference were district synods, local arms of the Conference in specific geographical areas that implemented the Conference’s decisions and regulated Wesleyan practices in their geographical region between Conference meetings.13 These districts were then arranged into circuits, groups of interdependent chapels in small geographical areas. These circuits were intended to function as collectives and rather than being responsible for a specific chapel, teams of ministers were assigned a circuit and collectively looked after its community’s pastoral needs and service requirements; circulating through each chapel and preaching at a different one every Sunday.14 As a result, although theological and liturgical decisions were imposed on individual chapels by the centralized structure of the Wesleyan Church, the day-to-day running of Wesleyan chapels was undertaken by lay trustees. They were responsible for chapels’ material fabric, decided how chapels could be used, and how money raised through congregational contributions was spent. These structural specificities allow particular insights into the everyday practices of Wesleyan communities to be gained through consideration of their becoming material characteristics. With very few exceptions, historians have either disregarded London’s nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Methodist communities as useful case studies, or have specifically discussed how London’s Methodist practices did not reflect broader trends within the contemporary Methodist movement.15 However, scholars have also acknowledged that all nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century (Wesleyan) Methodist practices were heavily geographically differentiated.16 As a result, while London was not illustrative of national trends, it is difficult to say that any other location was. Although London does not provide a ‘typical’ example of nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Wesleyanism, it is a useful case study because the density of its population and the high number of chapels built in relatively small geographical areas, means that Wesleyan practices in London are well documented. This is particularly true of this article’s time period between the 1851 religious census—which shocked and disturbed contemporaries by suggesting significant declines in church attendance—and the reunification of most Methodist denominations in 1932. However, despite being such a well-document moment of Methodist practice, this period has received relatively little scholarly attention, due to historical emphasis on the denomination’s early development.17 Methodist practices in London between 1851 and 1932 provide a fresh and interesting example with which to explore issues of everyday congregational experience. Consideration of the many religious surveys conducted in London between 1851 and 1932 has directed both this article’s denominational focus and informed the specific chapel communities it will discuss.18 First, these surveys demonstrate that Wesleyanism was the most numerous Methodist denomination in London during this period. Second, the surveys also illustrate geographical patterns of Wesleyanism growth and decline in particular areas of London between 1851 and 1932.19 Especially interesting are the increasing number of chapels which were constructed in north London in response to suburbanization during this period, and—like many contemporary Christian denominations—the Wesleyan Church’s emphasis on providing chapels, mission halls and central halls in poverty stricken areas of London’s East End. As a result, this article will discuss chapels from three circuits: the Stoke Newington and Highgate Circuits in suburban north London and the Bow (later Poplar and Bow) Circuit in London’s East End and the Isle of Dogs.20 While the chapels in these circuits had many differences—particularly in regard to the social status of their congregation members—they were united by their continual financial tribulations. Consideration of the financial position of these circuit communities between 1851 and 1932 has demonstrated that, like many nineteenth-century church, these chapels were either in debt—generally as a result of loans taken out to fund large-scale building work—or were precariously balanced on the edge of debt—often at least partly due to the financial pressures of maintaining their buildings.21 Although chapels could apply for loans from the Metropolitan Chapel Building Fund when building new chapels, and there is evidence that within circuits communities chapels shared their financial resources, chapels’ finances were ultimately dependent on donations from their congregation members, fundraising activities and money raised by leasing their buildings to external users.22 This financial context forms an important basis for this article’s exploration of what moments of maintenance and repair illustrate about everyday Methodist practices and how these communities negotiated shifting amalgamations of worship, evangelism, fellowship, and practicality. Material Becoming and Everyday Religion While studies of contemporary religious communities have paid increasing attention to everyday practices and experiences over the past twenty years, exploring similar questions within a historical context has been frequently hindered by the scarcity of written reflections left by ordinary congregation members. However, material religion approaches—spearheaded by the editors of the Material Religion journal—have demonstrated the potential of using material things to gain glimpses into the religious everyday. Arguing that a broad range of material things—well-beyond sacred objects and texts—are fundamental components of religious practices, they demonstrate how thinking about the material practices, places, and bodies involved in religion undermines conventional scholarly emphasis on religious thought and belief, and argue that it allows greater attention to be given to everyday religious practices.23 While not specifically developed for historical purposes, material religion approaches have provided a useful framework for historical explorations of everyday experiences of religious communities. For example, historians Carmen Mangion and William Whyte have demonstrated how the materiality of purpose-built religious spaces influenced how religious practices were experienced in the nineteenth century.24 However, existing studies have tended to focus on objects and buildings as containers of meaning created when they were designed, used, or exchanged.25 As a result, little attention has been paid to objects’ material qualities, how they change over time, or the effect that these changing qualities have on human behaviour and experience. Furthermore—and maybe as a result—when material approaches have been used to discuss individuals’ experiences of religious spaces, these explorations have almost exclusively focussed on what objects reveal about individuals’ spiritual engagements with a religious movement.26 Congregants’ engagements with mundane objects—such as cleaning equipment, tables, chairs or crockery—and their impact on congregants’ everyday experiences of these spaces—including their social relationships or physical (dis)comfort—have been overlooked. It is in order to overcome these difficulties that this article focuses on moments of maintenance and repair in Wesleyan chapels. Engaging with the ideas of Jane Bennett, Tim Dant, Ian Hodder, Tim Ingold, and Bjornar Olsen, it positions these moments of maintenance and repair within broader discussions of material ‘becoming’.27 Bennett describes ‘becoming’ as a slow material change which happens so gradually that the material alternations are not immediately obvious. Often responding to a gradual deterioration in the material condition of Wesleyan spaces, moments of maintenance and repair are indicative of slow material changes that made them necessary. Therefore, although Wesleyan chapels ‘became’ in many ways, archival references to maintenance and repair are some of the very few illustrations of these processes historians have access to.28 A growing body of literature concerned with processes of maintenance and repair has already begun to demonstrate how consideration of responses to material becoming are indicative of the everyday practices that make them necessary.29 Stephen Graham and Nigel Thrift have demonstrated how studying maintenance and repair bypasses analysis of designers’ intentions by diverting attention from moments of material ‘crisis’—i.e. the construction or destruction of objects and buildings—and focuses on everyday processes of small-scale material change. They argue that this then provides insights into individuals’ day-to-day engagements with and experiences of the material world.30 Similarly, in their analysis of individuals’ decisions about maintaining and repairing household objects, Nicky Gregson, Alan Metcalfe, and Louise Crewe have shown how investigating maintenance and repair illustrates users’ priorities, highlighting what they consider worth spending the time and effort to repair or maintain and what they do not.31 Despite these existing studies, to date there has been no attempt to use moments of maintenance and repair to analyse the implications of material becoming on the everyday lives of historical religious communities. In her analysis of the development of new maintenance legislation within the English Church during the thirteenth century, Carole Davidson Cragoe has paid much attention to the social implications of maintenance and repair.32 However, primarily focussing on the political and economic reasons why the responsibility for maintaining the external fabric and internal contents of churches was split between rectors and parishioners, she has focusses on the human decisions and political negotiations that informed the maintenance and repair of churches in the thirteenth century and does not fully consider the becoming materiality of these spaces and how they demanded repair and maintenance. In contrast, the geographer Tim Edensor has reflected on maintenance and repair as a consequence of churches’ material becoming, but has not considered the impact of these material developments on church communities.33 Taking St Ann’s Church in Manchester as a case study, he considers how the material qualities of this building have changed over time as a result of their inherent characteristics and relationships with other human and non-human actors, such as air pollution, water, atmospheric temperature and algae. He then discusses the consequences of these processes and the ongoing development of St Ann’s material qualities, specifically emphasizing how they have required acts of maintenance and repair to be undertaken to stabilize the church and prevent it from falling down. However, apparently unconcerned that the building he has analysed is a space of religious worship and fellowship, this is where Edensor’s explorations ends. His discussion includes no reflection on the people who undertook the necessary maintenance and repair he identifies, the money required to undertake it, or the impact it would have had on the sensory experiences of those who use the church. In response, this article will draw together these two approaches to think about both the material implications of the becoming nature of Wesleyan chapels, demonstrated through moments of maintenance and repair, and the broader implications of these processes, in relation to the chapel communities in which they occurred. It will think about how the material change of Wesleyan chapels and their contents affected congregations’ sensory experiences and demanded human responses, as well as reflecting on what communities’ responses to these material challenges suggest about their priorities. In particular, it will emphasize how congregations juggled the competing requirements of Wesleyan theology, the practicalities of maintaining a functioning building, and their financial pressures. Organs: Divine Worship and Financial Requirements The importance of music and singing within Methodists’ divine worship has been well documented, but the materiality of these practices have not. Organs were initially discouraged and (later) officially prohibited in Methodist chapels. Considered reminiscent of the soulless formal worship of Church of England services, John Wesley and the early founders of the Methodist movement were concerned that the music organs created distracted from hymns’ lyrics.34 However, in 1820, the Methodist Conference (begrudgingly) legitimized the use of organs in Wesleyan services and by the end of the nineteenth century, these instruments were not only tools of divine worship, but also material statements of chapels’ political intent.35 Accompanying the many hymns written for Methodist communities as clear and concise expressions of the movement’s theological beliefs, organs provided musical emphasis for the tenants of the Wesleyan faith. At the same time, the erection of organs created large metal and wooden structures, which acted as impressive material expressions of Wesleyan communities’ permanency and their shift from spiritual movement to official Church [3]. Within this context, the development of organs’ material properties within Wesleyan chapels—highlighted by the many references to their repair and maintenance—illustrates how these communities were constantly juggling the competing priorities of their theological beliefs, political status, financial positions, and everyday material practicalities. Fig 3. Open in new tabDownload slide W. Whiffin, interior view of the Poplar Chapel, London, c.1920s. Built in 1848. W/PMC/7/4/3. © Tower Hamlets Local History Library and Archives. Fig 3. Open in new tabDownload slide W. Whiffin, interior view of the Poplar Chapel, London, c.1920s. Built in 1848. W/PMC/7/4/3. © Tower Hamlets Local History Library and Archives. Initial consideration of how Wesleyan chapel organs were becoming things that changed over time necessitates an exploration of the amount of money that Wesleyan communities spent when installing them. The Jackson’s Lane Chapel in north London planned to pay £800.0.0 for their new organ in 1907 (the equivalent of nearly £63,000 in 2017), the Archway Road Chapel spent £394.0.0 on their new organ in 1877 (roughly £26,000 in 2017) and the Holly Park Chapel spent £600.0.0 on their new organ between 1882 and 1883 (nearly £40,000 in 2017).36 These large sums suggest the importance accorded to organs within nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Wesleyan communities. However, while sometimes prepared to spend considerable sums when purchasing organs, Wesleyans also commonly established strict spending limits when erecting organs, negotiating the relative importance of organ’s theological and political importance and chapels’ financial stability. For example, when plans were made to install a new organ at the Old Ford Chapel in east London in 1887, the chapel’s trustees made it clear that they did not want to proceed unless they could be sure that the venture would not put them in debt.37 Indeed, despite the importance of organs, the expense associated with them was so substantial that many chapels could not afford such an investment and decided to hire, buy second hand, or purchase a harmonium (a small organ without pipes) [4].38 Fig 4. Open in new tabDownload slide Portable Harmonium c. 1900. Private collection. Photography by author, 2019. Fig 4. Open in new tabDownload slide Portable Harmonium c. 1900. Private collection. Photography by author, 2019. As a result, it comes as no surprise that once organs were installed, many communities adopted a regular routine of tuning, cleaning and repairing to make sure that their organs effectively functioned as musical instruments and looked aesthetically impressive. For example, in 1890, in response to complaints made by the Holly Park Sunday School Committee that the school organ was out of tune, the chapel’s trustees took the necessary steps to put the organ into good repair.39 In 1897, the organ pipes and wall around Old Ford Chapel’s organ were redecorated using £11.0.0 from the chapel’s Bazaar Fund.40 In addition to these regular processes of maintenance and repair, some chapels took precautions to prevent their organs from being misused or damaged in the first place.41 For instance, in 1883, Holly Park Chapel’s trustees stipulated that in order to protect their organ, the instrument should only be played by the organist and competent persons under the organist’s direction.42 Such levels of care and maintenance were not implemented throughout London’s Wesleyan communities. Some chapels did not carry out the necessary maintenance work to retain their organs in suitable working condition. Reflecting on his years at Bow Road Chapel in the early twentieth century, Mr C. P. Clifford explained that while he had initially attended this chapel’s services because of their organ music, this chapel’s organ—like many in the early twentieth century—regularly needed more care and attention to improve its condition and sound.43 Illustrating this point, in 1921 J. W. Walker and Son Ltd. estimated that it would cost £64.18.0 (the equivalent of roughly £1800 in 2017) to clean and repair the organ at Jackson’s Lane Chapel because no repair or maintenance work had been undertaken on the organ since it was first erected in 1909.44 However, it was not only negligence that resulted in the material deterioration of these instruments. As instruments within the semi-public space of Wesleyan chapels, organs were regularly (mis)used by many individuals. In the early twentieth century, the Muswell Hill Chapel charged small sums to allow people to practise on their organ.45 Similarly, in 1925 the Old Ford Chapel gave several young men permission to use their organ during the week. Interestingly, this decision was made despite the protests of the chapel’s organist, Mr Baldock, who explicitly noted that he was concerned that this would result in the organ being damaged. Consequently, when they took the decision to prioritize the musical development of their young people over the organ’s material quality, the chapel’s trustees also released Mr Baldock from his responsibility of keeping the organ in pristine condition. This illustrates how some chapel communities were more concerned that their organs were used than maintained.46 The extent to which different chapels took steps to repair and maintain their organs’ material, musical and aesthetic values highlights variations in their priorities. While some maintained both the visual quality and musical function of their organs in order to create grand chapel spaces filled with tuneful and impressive music, others took a more pragmatic approach. Allowing congregation members to play the organ for a small fee financially helped the Muswell Hill Chapel while also giving congregation members use of their chapel space for personal pleasure and improvement outside of official chapel services and events. Forgoing regular maintenance checks on organ’s pipes allowed some Wesleyan chapels to reduce the financial burden of their organs, but it also detracted from the quality of the music they produced. Therefore, some chapels considered the price of material maintenance a cost worth paying to facilitate their spiritual practices, while others took the opinion that congregants’ spiritual or auditory experiences were not sufficiently undermined by some level of material degeneration to warrant constant expenditure on maintenance and repair. Acknowledging the important influence of financial pressures on the everyday practices of Wesleyan communities is important because, as Sarah Flew has illustrated, churches’ financial records and the impact on their financial practices have been chronically under considered within the existing literature.47 In this instance, consideration of chapels’ financial records not only illustrates how decisions about the maintenance and repair of Wesleyan organs were made by chapels’ trustees, also demonstrates how these decisions directly affected all congregants’ experiences of these spaces. As Mr Clifford’s testimony attests, decisions to reduce the regularity with which organs were tuned and cleaned detracted from the quality of the sounds that congregants heard when engaging in divine worship. Additionally, when trustees did decide to repair and maintain their organs, congregants often played an important role in raising the money to make this possible. For instance, in 1897 the Holly Park Chapel Choir undertook fundraising to pay for the improvements to the chapel’s organ, in the same year the Old Ford Chapel organized a bazaar to raise money to paint their organ pipes, and in 1921 the Jackson’s Lane Chapel’s trustees invited members of their congregation to make subscription payments towards the repair of their organ.48 These fundraising practices were part of a broader culture of giving and raising money within Wesleyan communities. Often organized by female congregants, chapels regularly initiated special collections, subscription systems, bazaars and busy bee sales to raise money for particular causes both within and beyond their chapel.49 While motivated by Wesleyan theological perspectives on the importance of giving and sharing funds, such practices involved a range of social interactions and material activities well beyond stereotypically ‘Wesleyan’ actions. Congregants used their social networks to ask for money and their material skills to make food, clothes and crafts to sell at bazaars and busy bee sales. Therefore, considering the maintenance and repair of chapels’ organs emphasizes the intertwined nature of Wesleyans’ spiritual, social and practical priorities, demonstrating how chapel trustees had to negotiate the competing demands of Wesleyan theology and the financial realities of practically maintaining the material qualities of their buildings. Furthermore, it illustrates some of the alternative ways in which ordinary congregation members experienced Wesleyan spaces as they took an active role in raising money to make these processes of maintenance and repair possible. Interior Repairs: Fellowship and Skill In addition to the specific material needs of Wesleyan organs, the becoming nature of Wesleyan chapels meant that their walls, furniture, windows, heating systems, ventilation systems etc. demanded regular cleaning, re-decoration and repair. This encompassed a variety of tasks, ranging from a coat of paint to more comprehensive renovation work. While some of these tasks required chapels to employ professionals with appropriate levels of skill, others were regularly undertaken by amateur members of Wesleyan communities. Although design historians have regularly considered the creative skill of amateur interior designers or crafts people—often challenging the gendered distinctions between amateur and professional—there has been little consideration of the skill required to repair or maintain buildings and objects, or the relationship between amateurs and professionals in this process.50 However, considering when and why it was acceptable for individuals unable to evidence the required skills to undertake processes of maintenance and repair in Wesleyan chapels, can provide further insights into the day-to-day negotiations and practices that occurred within Wesleyan chapels. The records of many of London chapels include references to professional workmen employed to undertake maintenance work that required specific knowledge and experience. For example, in 1897, the Holly Park Chapel paid Mr Woodman of 75 High Street Marylebone £185 to repair the chapel’s drains, and in 1923, the Jackson’s Lane Chapel paid J. Jeffries and Co. £22.11.4 for repairs to their heating apparatus.51 These professional individuals were regularly employed on the recommendation of congregation members and trustees. For example, when the Old Ford Chapel expanded their school and vestry in 1895, trustee William Hunter—who was a professional builder—and his brother John undertook the work.52 Although often known to these communities through personal ties, the individuals undertaking skilled maintenance and repair work within chapel spaces were generally employed at a competitive rate. Therefore, even though Wesleyan communities often employed individuals they knew to contribute to the maintenance and repair of their buildings, they were also willing to pay the necessary fees to ensure that complicated processes of repair and maintenance were undertaken in a professional manner. Less specialized maintenance and repair tasks were often undertaken by congregation members at a reduced or waived fee. For instance, in 1909, Robert William Bacon, a member of the Poplar Chapel’s congregation who was a builder by trade, was thanked for cleaning out the church’s gutters at no expense to the trust.53 While many of these voluntary acts of maintenance and repair were undertaken to a satisfactory standard, this was not always the case. In the beginning of 1889, Mr Godwin—a congregation member described as a commercial traveller and with no apparent professional experience to qualify him for maintenance repair work—designed and installed a new ventilation system in the Bow Road Chapel. However, only months later, Mrs Saunders—secretary of the Ladies’ Sewing Meeting at Bow Road Wesleyan Chapel—complained that not only had Mr Godwin’s system not improved the congregants’ comfort, but it had actually increased the draughts in the chapel. Therefore, while Mr Godwin had attempted to serve his chapel by freely offering his services to solve a problem with its material fabric, it appears that his actions initially detracted from congregant’s sensory experiences rather than improving them. Keen to solve this problem and improve the quality of congregational experience within their chapel, the trustees took immediate action. Urging Mr Godwin to quickly make effective repairs, they implied that if the problem was not satisfactorily and swiftly solved, they were prepared to hire professional help to deal with the issue.54 Fortunately, Mr Godwin seems to have satisfied the trustees’ demands, and there are no further records of subsequent alterations to the chapel’s ventilation system or congregational complaints about uncomfortable draughts. Consequently, while Mr Godwin was clearly not entirely proficient in designing and implementing ventilation systems—resulting in temporary discomfort for some chapel members—his services would have been substantially cheaper than those of professional workman, potentially providing long-term financial benefits worth the momentary inconvenience. Wesleyan communities did not only engage congregation members to conduct actions of repair and maintenance because it saved them money. In many instances, small and apparently simple processes of maintenance and repair were undertaken by individuals that Wesleyan communities knew were in need of financial support or material security. For example, in 1920, the mission hall at the Bow Common Chapel in east London needed to be redecorated. Mr Goodwin, one of the chapel’s trustees, offered the services of his son, who although not trained as a painter or decorator was unemployed—potentially after recently returning from the First World War—and in the search of work. It was suggested that the trustees pay the cost of the materials and a modest wage to Mr Goodwin’s son, simultaneously reducing the cost of decorating their mission hall and providing the young man with modest employment.55 By doing so, the trustees used the necessary maintenance and repair demanded by their chapel’s material becoming as an opportunity to engage in an act of fellowship and support a member of their community. Similarly, it is common to find references to chapels employing individuals they knew were in need as chapel keepers. Men and women specifically responsible for maintaining chapels’ material condition and social order, chapel keepers were generally provided with residential accommodation on or near the chapel they were responsible for. An advert for a new chapel keeper at the Poplar Chapel in 1886 demonstrates what these roles involved. It notes that the individual employed would be responsible for keeping all parts of the chapel clean at all times; carrying out a deep clean of the chapel in May and November; sweeping all parts of the chapel, including the pews, once a week and dusting it twice; operating and maintaining both the gas and lighting systems in the chapel; monitoring the chapel’s drainage system; protecting the organ from unauthorized use; locking the chapel up after services; and make sure that all the necessary material items were ready for the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, Lovefeasts and Baptisms.56 As a result, chapel keepers were important members of chapel communities and were principally responsible for their maintenance and repair. However, because Wesleyan communities often used this role to provide a home and financial support for those in need, the individuals they appointed did not always have the necessary skills to identify, reverse or prevent the material becoming of Wesleyan spaces. For example, in 1879 Mr Daily, the Poplar Chapel’s keeper underwent a disciplinary hearing, was absolved of his misconduct, given a second chance, and placed on three months’ probation. While the specific nature of his misconduct is not explicitly mentioned in the chapel’s records, references to how ‘his re-engagement shall depend on his general good conduct and attention to his duties’ and that ‘he [Mr Daily] had seen Mr Cravenock and signed the pledge’, suggest that Mr Daily had had an unhealthy relationship with alcohol, which had been having a detrimental effect on his ability to maintain and organize the chapel space.57 No further references to Mr Daily, attempts by the Poplar Chapel to appoint a new chapel keeper (until 1886), or unusual references to the need for urgent repair or maintenance work to be carried out inside the chapel suggests that Mr Daily passed his three month review and began to undertake his responsibilities to a satisfactory standard. However, his initial misdemeanours illustrate how Wesleyan attempts to implement their theological beliefs in forgiveness and fellowship had the potential to detrimentally effect on the material quality of their chapel spaces. Nevertheless, Wesleyan communities’ kindness was not always misplaced. For example, throughout the 1890s, Mrs Argent served as the Bow Road Chapel’s chapel keeper.58 A long-term member of the chapel, Mrs Argent was a widow whose son taught in the Bow Road’s Sunday School. References to increases in her salary, the trustees’ decision to give her bonuses to demonstrate their gratefulness for her ‘efficient manner’, and the chapel’s decision to not charge her rent while building work was being carried out at the chapel in 1891, all suggest that the chapel’s trustees not only treated Mrs Argent with respect, but also highly rated her skill.59 Therefore, many individuals with different levels of skill were involved in the maintenance and repair of Wesleyan chapels. While professionals were employed to undertake particularly complicated tasks, congregation members or permanent chapel keepers undertook more mundane jobs for little or no money. Although these appointments often saved chapels money, they also facilitated theologically inspired acts of forgiveness and fellowship. As a result, those employed to repair or maintain Wesleyan chapels did not always improve the material condition of the spaces, highlighting how Wesleyan communities who owned properties were constantly juggling the practicalities of responding to the becoming material condition of their chapels, the financial pressures this created, and their theological motivations. Conclusions It is—of course—no surprise that Wesleyan chapels and the material things that circulated through them were in constant need of repair and maintenance. However, by approaching the need for and implementation of repair and maintenance as the result of chapel’s material becoming, this article has been able to highlight previously un(der)told stories about London’s Wesleyan communities. First, it has illustrated the interrelationships between chapel communities’ spiritual practices and practical actions. Whether it was a chapel’s organ or interior fabric, communities rarely had sufficient money to maintain these material things to the standard they wished for theological purposes. As a result, chapel communities made compromises, only interfering with the material deterioration of their buildings and contents when they thought it was severely detracting from the theological purposes of these spaces. At times, this resulted in congregants having unpleasant sensory experiences within Wesleyan spaces and often meant that congregants were required to engage in fundraising practices to financially support urgent material repairs. Additionally, reflecting on references to maintenance and repair as illustrations of the material becoming of Wesleyan chapels has shown the variety of individuals and levels of skill involved in the repair and maintenance of Wesleyan spaces. Not always reflective of the skills required to undertake the various maintenance and repair work within Wesleyan spaces, the gap between the skill of the individual and the skills required for the job were often driven by communities’ desire to provide work for members of the congregations who were in need. Therefore, they also demonstrate the everyday balances these communities made between the pressures of maintaining the material fabric of their buildings, living within their financial needs and acting out their theological beliefs. These conclusions may seem mundane, but that does not make them unimportant. Indeed, the considerable effort that congregation members exerted to raise money for the necessary repair and maintenance of Wesleyan spaces suggests that chapels’ material fabric, their impact on congregational experiences, and their contribution to the effectiveness of Wesleyan practices were essential. Furthermore, the volume of complaints within chapel archives illustrates the fervent feelings that drafts, leaks and badly heated or ventilated rooms sparked. Therefore, this article is not only intended as a statement of the importance of thinking about the becoming nature of buildings and material things, but is also an argument for the necessity of considering mundane aspects of religious practice. While it demonstrates how thinking about repair and maintenance can be used to draw specific conclusions about congregational experiences of Wesleyanism in nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century London, the same approach could be applied to any institutional space to facilitate a broad range of historical insights into ordinary individuals’ everyday experiences of institutional spaces. However, it is also wise to add a proviso. While instances of maintenance and repair are some of the most regular issues recorded in chapel archives, these references are normally short and sketchy. Therefore, using these sources requires a willingness for creative thought, a readiness to position oneself within the material spaces discussed in the archives, and a preparedness to reflect on the sensory experiences that congregation members may have had in these contexts. Although the conclusions reached using this approach can rarely be securely collaborated or triangulated, they do provide insights that would otherwise be completely overlooked. Dr Ruth Slatter is a cultural and historical geographer interested in everyday experiences of institutional spaces in the long nineteenth century. With a background in art and design history, she completed the RCA/V&A History of Design MA in 2012 before being awarded a Wolfson Foundation Humanities Scholarship to undertake a PhD in the UCL Department of Geography. Completed in 2017, her PhD research focussed on how the material design of Wesleyan buildings and objects can provide insights into congregational experiences of Wesleyan Methodism in London between 1851 and 1932. Now a lecturer in human geography at the University of Hull, Ruth is continuing to develop her explorations of congregational experiences of Methodism, extending her geographical interest to the entirety of England and her time period to the long nineteenth century (1791–1932). She is currently paying particular attention to the visual and literary art of the Pre-Raphaelite and devout Methodist James Smetham, alongside ongoing collaborative research with Helen Cresswell on visitors’ experiences of London’s 1862 International Exhibition. Acknowledgements I declare that there are no conflicts of interest related to this article. This article has been written using research undertaken during my PhD, conducted at University College London with funding from the Wolfson Foundation. I thank my two supervisors, James Kneale and Claire Dwyer, and numerous others who commented on my work, including Caroline Bressey, Angela Connelly, Richard Dennis, David Gilbert, Carmen Mangion and William Whyte. I also express my gratitude to the Royal Geographical Society’s Historical Geography Research Group and all those attending the 2019 HGRG writing retreat for their support while completing this article as well as this article’s anonymous reviewers and Fiona Fisher for their insightful comments and guidance. Footnotes 1 F. J. Jobson, Chapel and School Architecture: As Appropriate to the Buildings of Nonconformists, Particularly to Those of the Wesleyan Methodists: With Practical Directions for the Erection of Chapels and School-Houses (London: Hamilton, Adams, & Co, 1850), 15; Stoke Newington High Street Wesleyan Chapel Trustees Minute Book 1816–1879, 26 August 1850, Stoke Newington Methodist Church. 2 For architectural approaches to Methodist Chapels as reflections of Methodist theology, see J. F. Butler, ‘Methodist Architecture in Relation to Methodist Liturgy’, Institute for the Study of Worship and Religious Architecture; Research Bulletin (1977): 20–45; C. Stell, Nonconformist Chapels and Meeting-Houses, vols. 1–4 (1991–2002). 3 Stoke Newington High Street Wesleyan Chapel, op. cit., 24 and 30 November 1881. 4 Stoke Newington High Street Wesleyan Chapel, op. cit., 21 November 1924. 5 Stoke Newington High Street Wesleyan Chapel, op. cit., 21 November 1924. 6 ‘Unchurched’ was a word used by Methodists during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to refer to people who did not regularly attend chapel or church services. For more, see J. E. McCullagh, The Open Church for the Unchurched (New York: Fleming H. Revell Co, 1905). 7 For an overview of recent geographical approaches to faith spaces, see V. Della Dora, ‘Sacred Space Unbound’, Society and Space, Virtual Issue 13 (2015), http://societyandspace.org/2015/06/12/virtual-issue-13-sacred-space-unbound/, accessed 23 January 2019. 8 K. Cracknell and S. J. White, An Introduction to World Methodism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005). 9 K. S. Inglis, Churches and the Working Classes in Victorian England (London: Routledge, 1963), 85–100; H. D. Rack, ‘Wesleyan Methodism, 1849–1902’, in A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain, eds. R. Davies, A. R. George and G. Rupp, vol. 3 (London: Epworth Press, 1983), 119–166 and 123. 10 Cracknell and White, op. cit., 93, 98, 137. 11 Inglis, op. cit., 85–100; Rack, op. cit., 123; D. W. Bebbington, ‘The Mid-Victorian Revolution in Wesleyan Methodist Home Mission’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History 70 (2019): 77–97. 12 R. Davies (ed.), A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain, vol. 1 (London: Epworth Press, 1965), 242–251; Davies, George and Rupp, op. cit., 67–70 and 547–552. 13 J. S. Simon, A Summary of Methodist Law and Discipline (London: Methodist Publishing House, 1923), 331–370. 14 ‘Minutes from the 1746 Methodist Conference’, Minutes of the Methodist Conferences, from the First Held in London, by the Late Rev. John Wesley, A.M., in the year 1744, vol. 1 (London: The Conference Office, 1862), 33; Cracknell and White, op. cit., 118. 15 P. S. Ell and K. D. M. Snell, River Jerusalems: The Geography of Victorian Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 125; J. Crump, ‘Our Struggle in London: Primitive Methodists and the Metropolis’, The London Journal 43 (2018): 137–162. For exceptions, see the work of Clive Field: C. D. Field, ‘Methodism in Metropolitan London, 1850–1920: A Social and Sociological Study’ (DPhil diss., Wadham College, University of Oxford, 1974); C. D. Field, ‘Vignettes of London Methodism in the Early Twentieth Century (Part 1)’, Wesley Historical Society: London and South East Branch 77 (2008): 6–19. 16 D. C. Harvey, C. Brace and A. R. Bailey, ‘Parading the Cornish Subject: Methodist Sunday Schools in West Cornwall, c. 1830–1930’, Journal of Historical Geography 33 (2007), 24–44, 27. 17 For existing approaches to Wesleyan Methodism in nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Britain, see R. B. Walker, ‘The Growth of Wesleyan Methodism in Victorian England and Wales’, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 24 (1973): 267–284; T. S. Engerman, ‘Religion and Political Reform: Wesleyan Methodism in Nineteenth-Century Britain’, Journal of Church and State 24 (1982): 321–336; D. Hempton, The Religion of the People; Methodism and Popular Religion c. 1750–1900 (London: Routledge, 1996); A. R. Bailey, D. Harvey and C. Brace, ‘Disciplining Youthful Methodist Bodies in Nineteenth-Century Cornwall’, Annuals of the Association of American Geographers 97 (2007): 142–157; Harvey, Brace and Bailey, ‘Parading the Cornish Subject’, op. cit.; C. Brace, A. R. Bailey and D. Harvey, ‘Investigating the Spatialities of Youth Spirituality: Methodist Mutual Improvement in Cornwall (UK) c.1870–1930,’ in Emerging Geographies of Belief, eds. C. Brace, A. Bailey, S. Carter, D. Harvey and N. Thomas (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011), 74–90; E. Ross, ‘St. Francis in Soho: Emmeline Pethick, Mary Neal, the West London Wesleyan Mission, and the Allure of ‘Simple Living’ in the 1890s’, Church History 83 (2014): 843–883. 18 Great Britain Census Office and H. Mann, Census of Great Britain, 1851: Religious Worship in England and Wales (London: G. Routledge, 1854); The Religious Census of London Reprinted from ‘The British Weekly’ (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1888); R. Mudie-Smith, The Religious Life of London (London : Hodder and Stoughton, 1904); C. Booth, Life and Labour of the People in London, vol. 7, Third Religious Influences (London: Macmillan, 1903). 19 R. Slatter, ‘A “More-Than-Architectural” Approach to Wesleyan Space: How Can Material and Spatial Approaches to Metropolitan Wesleyan Methodist Practices Provide Insights into Congregational Experiences between 1851 and 1932?’(PhD diss., University College London, 2017), 50–51. 20 The number and location of chapels within circuits regularly changed. Between 1851 and 1932, the following chapels were in these circuits (not all simultaneously). Stoke Newington Circuit: High Street Chapel, Green Lanes Chapel, Mildmay Park Chapel, Northwold Road Chapel, Kingsland Crossway and Matthias Road mission halls. Highgate Circuit: Hornsey Road Chapel, Archway Road Chapel, Holly Park Chapel, Middle Lane Chapel, Muswell Hill Chapel, Jackson’s Lane Chapel. Bow (later Poplar and Bow) Circuit: Bow Road Chapel, Old Ford Chapel, Bow Common Chapel, Barking Road Chapel, Poplar Chapel, Millwall Chapel, Cubitt Town Chapel. 21 Slatter, ‘A “More-Than-Architectural” Approach to Wesleyan Space’, op. cit., 430–492. For discussion of the more general financial position of nineteenth-century Church communities, see S. Green, Religion in the Age of Decline: Organisation and Experience in Industrial Yorkshire 1870–1920 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). 22 Anon, ‘The Growth of Metropolitan Methodism’, c. 1890, Scrapbook 9 (Oxford Centre for Methodism and Church History), 147. 23 D. Morgan, ‘Introduction: The Matter of Belief’, in Religion and Material Culture: The Matter of Belief, ed. D. Morgan (Abingdon: Routledge, 2010), 1–18. 24 C. M. Mangion, ‘“To Console, to Nurse, to Prepare for Eternity”: The Catholic Sickroom in Late Nineteenth-Century England’, Women’s History Review 21 (2012): 657–672; W. Whyte, Unlocking the Church: The Lost Secrets of Victorian Sacred Space (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017). 25 R. Slatter, ‘Material “Becomings” and a Historical Geography of Religious Experience: Metropolitan Methodism, 1851–1932’, Area 51.1 (2019): 14–24. 26 C. McDannell, Material Christianity; Religion and Popular Culture in America (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1995); V. Della Dora, ‘Circulating Sacred Place: Fin-de Siècle Russian Cards of Mount Athos as Travelling Object-Icons’, in Emerging Geographies of Belief, eds. C. Brace, A. Bailey, S. Carter, D. Harvey and N. Thomas (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011), 168–192; J. Garnett and A. Harris, ‘Faith in the Home Catholic Spirituality and Devotional Materiality in East London’, Material Religion: The Journal of Objects, Art, and Belief 7 (2011): 299–302. 27 J. Bennett, Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2010); T. Dant, Materiality and Society (New York: Open University Press, 2005); I. Hodder, Entangled: An Archaeology of the Relationship between Humans and Things (London: Wiley, 2012); T. Ingold, ‘Towards an Ecology of Material’, Annual Review of Anthropology 41 (2012): 427–442; B. Olsen, In Defense of Things: Archaeology and the Ontology of Objects (Lanham, New York, Toronto, Plymouth, UK: Altamiar Press, Rowan and Littlefield Publishers, 2010). 28 Bennett, op. cit., 57–58; Slatter, ‘Material “Becomings” and a Historical Geography of Religious Experience’, op. cit. 29 S. Brand, How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They’re Built (New York: Viking, 1994), 110–131; K. Franz, Tinkering: Consumers Reinvent the Early Automobile (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005); S. Graham and N. Thrift, ‘Out of Order: Understanding Repair and Maintenance’, Theory, Culture and Society 24 (2007): 1–25; N. Gregson, A. Metcalfe and L. Crewe, ‘Practices of Object Maintenance and Repair: How Consumers Attend to Consumer Objects within the Home’, Journal of Consumer Culture 9 (2009), 248–272; S. Bond, C. DeSilvey and J. R. Ryan, Visible Mending: Everyday Repairs in the South West (Axminster: Uniform Books, 2013); V. Kelley, ‘The Interpretation of Surface Boundaries, Systems and the Transgression in Clothing and Domestic Textiles, c.1880–1939’, Textile 7 (2009): 216–235. 30 Graham and Thrift, op. cit. 31 Gregson, Metcalfe, and Crewe, op. cit. 32 C. Davidson Cragoe, ‘The Custom of the English Church: Parish Church Maintenance in England before 1300’, The Journal of Medieval History 36 (2010): 20–38. 33 T. Edensor, ‘Entangled Agencies, Material Networks and Repair in a Building Assemblage: The Mutable Stone of St Ann’s Church Manchester’, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 36 (2011): 238–252. 34 J. Lightwood, Methodist Music of the Eighteenth Century (London: The Epworth Press, 1927), 41. 35 ‘QXXII What Is the Decision of the Conference on the Erection of Organs in Our Chapels?’, Minutes of the Methodist Conference, from the first, held in London, by the Late Rev. John Wesley, A.M., in the year 1744, vol. 5 (London: J. Kershaw, 1825), 146. 36 For Jackson’s Lane Chapel, see ‘Jackson’s Lane Wesleyan Chapel Treasurer’s Account, 1895–1897’, 15 October 1897, ldbcm:a/7/2/12/1, Haringey Archives (hereafter HA); The National Archives Currency Converter: 1270–2017, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter, accessed 14 January 2019. For Holly Park Chapel, this is the estimate that was selected by the trustees. There is no record of exactly how much the organ cost. ‘Holly Park Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book, 1881–1928’, 18 March 1882, LMA/4009/HP/03/001, London Metropolitan Archives (hereafter LMA); The National Archives Currency Converter: 1270–2017, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter, accessed 14 January 2019. 37 ‘Old Ford Chapel Trustees’ Meetings Minute Book 1871–1915’, 18 March 1887, ACC/1850/243, LMA. 38 ‘Jackson’s Lane Wesleyan Chapel Treasurer’s Account, 1895–1897’, 7 September 1905 and 19 December 1905. 39 ‘Holly Park Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book, 1881–1928’, 15 March 1890. 40 ‘Holly Park Chapel Choir Minute Book, 1895–1926’, 1897 Choir Report, LMA/4009/HP/04/001, HP. 41 ‘Holly Park Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book, 1881–1928’, 15 March 1890; 25 January 1900; 20 February 1900; ‘Holly Park Chapel Choir Minute Book, 1895–1926’, 1897 Choir Report; ‘Archway Road Chapel Trustees Meeting Minutes, 1883–1903’, 21 February 1898, LMA/4009/AR/03/002, LMA; ‘Middle Lane Chapel Peace Thanksgiving Fund Accounts, 1920–1922’, LMA/4009/ML/01/029, LMA; ‘Archway Road Chapel Trustees Meeting Minutes, 1903–1923’, 3 February 1922 and 2 March 1922, LMA/4009/AR/03/003. 42 ‘Holly Park Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book, 1881–1928’, 17 April 1883. 43 L. Farmer, The Bow Story (London: Epworth Press, 1965), 40. 44 ‘Jackson’s Lane Chapel Trustees Meeting Minutes, 1913–1927’, 30 June 1921, ldbcm:a/7/2/1/2, HA. £64.18.0 equivalent to roughly £1885 in 2017. Figures from the National Archives Currency Converter: 1270–2017, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter, accessed 14 January 2019. 45 ‘Muswell Hill Wesleyan Chapel Seat Rent Account Book, 1927–1946’, LMA/4009/MH/01/006, LMA. 46 ‘Old Ford Chapel Trustees’ Meetings Minute Book 1920–1976’, 24 July 1925, ACC/1850/244, LMA. 47 S. Flew, ‘Valuable Volumes: The Vital Importance of Financial Records to the Historical Researcher’, Catholic Archives 32 (2012): 1–11 and Philanthropy and the Funding of the Church of England, 1865–1914 (London: Pickering and Chatto, 2015). 48 Old Ford Chapel, ‘Old Ford Chapel Trustees’ Meetings Minute Book 1871–1915’, 9 October 1897 and 29 January 1898. Jackson’s Lane Chapel, ‘Jackson’s Lane Methodist Church Minutes of the Trustees Meetings 1913–1927’, 30 June 1921. 49 Slatter, ‘A “More-Than-Architectural” Approach to Wesleyan Space’, op. cit., 549–557. 50 For design historical discussions of amateur creative skill, see S. Knott, Amateur Craft: History and Theory (London: Bloomsbury, 2015); G. Lees-Maffei (ed.), ‘Special Issue: Professionalizing Interior Design 1870–1970’, Journal of Design History 21 (2008), 1–116. 51 Holly Park Chapel, ‘Trustees Meeting Minute Book, 1881–1928’, 28 October 1897. £185 equivalent to roughly £15,200 in 2017. Figures from the National Archives Currency Converter: 1270–2017, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter, accessed 14 January 2019. Jackson’s Lane Chapel: ‘Jackson’s Lane Chapel Treasurer’s Records, Account Book, 1905–1925’, 20 March 1923, ldbcm:a/7/2/6/1, HA. £22.11.5 equivalent to roughly £925 in 2017. Figures from the National Archives Currency Converter: 1270–2017, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter, accessed 14 January 2019. 52 ‘Old Ford Chapel, Directions for Appointment of New Trustees’, 1895, ACC/1850/221, LMA; ‘Old Ford Chapel Trustees’ Meetings Minute Book 1871–1915’, 1895. 53 ‘Poplar Wesleyan Chapel Trustees’ Meeting Minute Book 1846–1925’, September 1909, W/PMC/3/1/1, Tower Hamlets Local History Library. 54 ‘Bow Road Wesleyan Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book 1888–1922’, 11 December 1889, ACC/1850/153, LMA. 55 ‘Bow Road Wesleyan Chapel Trustees’ Meeting Minute Book, 1904–1936’, 14 February 1920, ACC/1850/153, LMA. 56 ‘Poplar Wesleyan Chapel Trustees’ Meeting Minute Book 1846–1925’, 23 September 1885 and 19 February 1886. 57 ‘Poplar Wesleyan Chapel Trustees’ Meeting Minute Book 1846–1925’, 10 December 1879. 58 The first reference to Mrs Argent as the Bow Road Chapel Keeper is in 1890 and she resigned in 1892: ‘Bow Road Wesleyan Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book 1888–1922’, 17 February 1890 and 7 September 1892. 59 ‘Bow Road Wesleyan Chapel Trustees Meeting Minute Book 1888–1922’, 17 February 1890 and 13 February 1891. © The Author(s) [2019]. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Design History Society. All rights reserved. This article is published and distributed under the terms of the Oxford University Press, Standard Journals Publication Model (https://academic.oup.com/journals/pages/open_access/funder_policies/chorus/standard_publication_model)
TI - Becoming Chapels and Everyday Congregations: How the Repair and Maintenance of London’s Wesleyan Chapels Illustrates Their Communities’ Everyday Practices and Experiences (1851–1932)
JF - Journal of Design History
DO - 10.1093/jdh/epz032
DA - 2020-05-26
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/oxford-university-press/becoming-chapels-and-everyday-congregations-how-the-repair-and-tB50AqQoMD
SP - 1
VL - Advance Article
IS - 
DP - DeepDyve
ER -