First Presbyterian Church of Alexandria

1931 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 167
Author(s):  
John W. Herndon
Keyword(s):  
Presbyterian Church ◽  
First Presbyterian Church

Helping the Homeless in Dallas: Lessons and Challenges from a Faith-Based Nonprofit

2010 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 11-16
Author(s):  
Julie Adkins
Keyword(s):  
Presbyterian Church ◽  
Church Staff ◽  
Faith Based ◽  
First Presbyterian Church ◽  
The Church

The Stewpot is an agency in downtown Dallas that has been serving the hungry and homeless for more than 30 years. Its founding story has become the stuff of legend: In the mid-1970s, First Presbyterian Church staff was approached more and more often by people living on the streets who needed something to eat. In response, the church started to keep on hand a supply of canned goods that could be handed out. At the time, the practice was that each person who asked would be given two cans of food, with the labels removed so that they could not be resold. But there came a day in 1975 when one of the associate pastors handed the last two cans to a man who needed them … and then helplessly watched him try to open one of the cans with the only tool available in his possession: a key. Before the end of the year First Presbyterian had given up on the notion of handing out cans of food, and had created the Stewpot, preparing and serving a noontime meal in the church's kitchen and fellowship hall. Within two weeks, there were more than 100 people coming for lunch every weekday (Adams 2006).

scholarly journals Alfred Newton Richards, 1876-1966

1967 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 327-342 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
New England ◽  
College Education ◽  
Total Income ◽  
Presbyterian Church ◽  
Best Friend ◽  
First Presbyterian Church ◽  
The Family ◽  
The Future

Alfred Newton Richards was born in Stamford, New York, U.S.A., on 22 March 1876, the youngest of three sons of the Rev. Leonard E. and Mary Elizabeth (Burbank) Richards. His father, who was pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Stamford from 1864 until his death in 1903, was a descendant of Godfrey Richards, an emigrant from the Rhenish Palatinate to Pennsylvania about 1740. His mother’s ancestors came from England to New England prior to 1640 and, unlike the Richards line (all of whom were farmers), many of them received a college education and several (including her father) were clergymen. She herself was teaching at a school in Norwalk, Ohio, when she first met her future husband. At the time she lived in the home of the Rev. Alfred Newton, who is still referred to as one of the most influential and beloved of Norwalk’s inhabitants, and whose daughter, Martha Newton, was the future Mrs Richards’s best friend. This is the source of the name Alfred Newton Richards. Life in the Richards’s home in Stamford centred around church activities and, by present standards, was quite austere. During most of the period the total income was less than $1000 a year, on which the family maintained a universally respected position in community affairs, put three sons through college, and set enough money aside to keep Mrs Richards in her home after her husband’s death without assistance from her sons or anybody else. In Dr Richards’s own words: ‘We were poor, but like Eisenhower’s folks we were unaware of it.’

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