Ford's Chapel United Methodist Church

Three years after the close of the Revolutionary War, in 1784, the first Methodist Conference in America was organized under the direction of John Wesley of England who appointed Thomas Coke and Francis Asbury as Bishops.

Indian relics and General Andrew Jackson battlefields are located in this area, called in that period, "The Big Bend Country" of the Tennessee River.

He created his charges, assigned his preachers, and ordained a group of young men to become ministers after a period of training.

At the Conference of 1802, James Gwinn was a member of the training class, and was given the title Methodist Missionary Circuit Rider.

Mr. Green Hill, a well-to-do planter and a devout Methodist asked them to use part of his land as a campground for the Conference.

This Conference was important to Ford's Chapel, because the missionary James Gwinn was sent to the "Big Bend Area" in October 1808.

Gwinn and that their home just west of this spot became a Methodist Society meeting place, and that he used it as headquarters when he came from Nashville to his circuit.

It is recorded in the Madison County Courthouse, Huntsville, AL that Richard Ford went to Nashville in June 1810 and bought his land.

At different times, the North Alabama Conference placed Ford's Chapel on the Meridianville, the Madison, and the Toney Circuits.

Three ministers went into the Methodist Ministry as members of Ford's Chapel: William H. Pettus, Carl Stovall, and Darby Mason.

Robert Paine was stationed here, 1819–1820, and later became President of Lagrange College and finally for sixteen years was a bishop of the various conferences.

Ford's Chapel had two other members who preached here their first year who have served the North Alabama Conference - E. Hobson Clarke in Education and Thelmer Vaughn in Finances.

The seating arrangement was reversed (making the front of the church as it appears today), the old choir bay was torn down and Sunday School rooms were added in the front, the annex was built (as a separate building and was not bricked), the sanctuary was bricked and the steeple was added with a bell installed in it.

On April 27, 2011, a tornado reached Harvest and destroyed the church's historic chapel, as well as its Family Life Center and steeple.