Birmingham Churches and Their Cornerstones 83
This church is located at 7340 Naples Avenue in the Brown Springs section of the East Lake neighborhood. Since there is another, older, A.M.E. Church named St. Paul within Birmingham, this one is designed St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church East Lake.
The Brown Springs neighborhood is located on the southern slope of Shades Mountain near Red Gap and the entry to the mining roads of Ruffner Mountain. It was established as an African American neighborhood and was still 81% Black in the 2020 census (with a population of only 393). It boasts a number of churches besides this one including St. James Missionary Baptist Church East Lake and the larger New Rising Star Baptist Church. (“The Star” as it calls itself is visible in the above photograph down the hill from St. James across Oporto-Madrid Boulevard from St. Paul A.M.E.)
One of the delights of this neighborhood and the nearby Gate City is that the streets are named alphabetically for European cities, beginning at the east end with Athens and continuing to Toulon.
According to the modest building’s handsome Alabama marble cornerstone, St. Paul A.M.E. was organized in 1908 and its current building was erected in 1965 when W. M. Morris was pastor. Birmingham’s famous Black businessman A. G. Gaston is listed on the stone as the secretary-treasurer of the church extension department which supported the erection of this building. Gaston was a committed member and supporter of the A.M.E. Church.
Read this first post for more on this series on Birmingham churches and their cornerstones.
Map of Posts in this Project
Each site in this project is mapped below. Clicking on an icon will bring up a box with a link to the post on the site. Please use it to browse the collection.
The color and shape of the location markers indicate the character of the cornerstones at each site. Stones like this with multiple names are red. If there is more than one stone at the site a shape is used. Click here for full information on the icons.
Chasing Churches 
I’d like to add a piece of interesting information to this article if I may. Ossie W. Mitchell (deceased), whose name appears on the cornerstone of this church as a Trustee, has a middle school that bears her name located nearby–501 81st St. S. (Ossie Ware Mitchell Middle School).
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Thanks for this information! That is good to know.
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[…] buildng. The current two-story building was constructed in 1964, one year before the neighboring St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church constructed its current […]
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[…] East Lake community. It is separated from other Brown Springs churches (including St. Paul A.M.E. Church East Lake and St. James Baptist Church East Lake) by Oporto-Madrid Boulevard, a major thoroughfare. The Star, […]
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