Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church is located in the Riley community on the west side of Birmingham. My attention was drawn to this church by a former student who pointed out that the names of both his grandparents and his father were on the church’s cornerstones. That is good testimony to the importance of these stones in family history and to the closeknit nature of many of these churches.
It took me until February to pedal out Riley to see the church for myself. But when, after a summer in Virginia and a fall and winter of not-much-cycling I got back on the saddle, Mt. Zion in Riley was my first destination.
The church is located at 3428 Maple Ave SW in Birmingham. The congregation was organized in 1905, its first building was erected in 1910, and rebuilt in after a fire in 1961. In 1996 a new, lager, church building was added.
Read this first post for more on this series on Birmingham churches and their cornerstones.
Chasing Churches 