DOWAGIAC, Mich. (AP) — At the zenith of its fame the tabernacle, constructed in 1890, held thousands of worshippers who came by train and horse-drawn wagon to attend revivals at Crystal Springs, Michigan’s oldest religious camp.
Today, the nearly 125-year-old Stella Cooper Memorial Tabernacle continues to welcome many young people to summer camps, as well as hosting weddings and other events.
But it is in need of major repairs to continue its mission, according to The Herald-Palladium of St. Joseph.
Dan Stuglik, director of Crystal Springs Camp & Retreat Center in Pokagon Township, where the massive tabernacle is located, is determined to keep it from fading into history.
“I’m a huge fan of historic preservation. The building went on for 124 years, and I don’t want it to go away while I’m in charge of it,” Stuglik said. “But it’s just not the historic significance. It’s not the things it has done for people, but what it can continue to do.”
The 12,000-square-foot Stella Cooper Tabernacle stands as a reminder of what the camp, an outdoor ministry of the United Methodist Church, means to the community, and what it can mean in the future, he said.
“My role is a steward of something that has been around for 150-some years now, and it’s my job to see that it continues,” Stuglik said of the camp founded in 1860.
Barbara Cook, 76, a local historian who remembers wandering the camp grounds as a child, agrees that the tabernacle must be saved.
“I think it’s crucial,” said Cook, a Niles native whose grandparents owned farm land nearby. “The tabernacle is synonymous with Crystal Springs. I would say it’s absolutely imperative. It’s what makes Crystal Springs very different than other places.”
The urgency of making needed repairs ”“ particularly the roof ”“ is why Stuglik is holding the “Saving Stella” dinner dance fundraiser on Nov. 22 at the St. Joseph Kickers Club in Berrien Springs.
Stuglik said the tabernacle needs about $500,000 in repairs. Many of its original fixtures, including a wooden stage and pulpit, remain.
The cost of fixing the roof, the most urgent project, is $85,000. Stuglik has been able to raise about $14,000 and has some additional funds set aside. He hopes to collect the rest through community contributions.
That would be fitting, as the original construction of the tabernacle was paid for through individual donations, including a key contribution from a St. Joseph resident whose company went on to become a world-famous apparel maker.
In contemplating the tabernacle’s future, Stuglik became curious about the identity of its namesake, Stella Cooper, and did some research, assisted by high school students from Niles.
He learned that the building had been named for the 9-year-old daughter of St. Joseph resident Samuel T. Cooper, who died in 1892. Stella died in 1887. Both daughter and father are buried in the St. Joseph City Cemetery along Lakeview Avenue. Stuglik could not determine the cause of the girl’s death.
Cooper, a retired Methodist minister, donated the final $1,000 for the $5,000 needed for tabernacle construction.
According to Cook’s history, Cooper told the fundraisers in a letter “I will pay my subscription (of) $1,000 if you will call the building the Stella Cooper Memorial Tabernacle in honor of my daughter.”
Stuglik also discovered that Cooper had founded S.T. Cooper & Sons in St. Joseph, known for making comfortable wool socks for lumberjacks. By 1878, they were producing nearly 2,500 pairs of seamless stockings each day.
After Samuel Cooper died, his sons Charles, Henry and Willis continued the enterprise, moving the factory to Ludington and later to Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 1900.
They branched out into making men’s underwear they called “Jockey” to emphasize its athleticism and flexibility.
During the Great Depression, Coopers Inc. was almost bankrupt. In 1934 the company designed a type of underwear they called a brief that was introduced at Marshall Fields in Chicago in January 1935.
Store managers ordered the window display removed because it was thought too risque. But before it could be taken down, 600 packages of Jockey shorts were sold in one day. In the next three months, 30,000 pairs were sold and “Jockey” became synonymous with men’s underwear.
In 1972, Coopers Inc. changed its name to Jockey International, now a globally recognized brand in more than 120 countries with headquarters still in Kenosha.
Crystal Springs had a long history before the tabernacle was built.
It grew out of the outdoor camp meetings that sprang up during the nationwide religious revival of the 1830s. Gatherings centered on the natural springs that bubbled up from the ground near the Dowagiac River.
The camp was dedicated Aug. 10, 1860, as the Big Springs Camp Ground. The name was changed to Crystal Springs in 1874, according to Barbara Cook’s history of the area.
People came from all over western and southwestern Michigan and northern Indiana to hear famous preachers. Camp meetings often lasted 10 days, with participants sleeping in tents or under wagons. Cottages were later built.
The Michigan Central Railroad rain excursion trains from Niles to Pokagon Township and Dowagiac, with stage coaches taking people the rest of the way to Crystal Springs. They were charged 10 cents a day admission, or 25 cents for the entire session.
During what Cook characterized as its “Golden Age” in the 1870s, as many as 8,000 people at a time flocked to the camp, dwarfing the nearby villages and creating what one observer called “pandemonium.”
In 1875 the Crystal Lodge was built with a dining hall and sleeping quarters and enough room for 5,000. A cold storage building was erected using the springs. The location included a fish hatchery. More than 100 cottages were available.
A witness called it “a beautiful miniature city in the woods.”
The Stella Cooper Memorial Tabernacle was dedicated in August 1890 to provide a large indoor worship place. It seated 4,000, with crowds spilling onto the grounds numbering in the thousands.
As many as six ministers at a time banded together to conduct services, accompanied by a choir of 100 and an organist on the stage.
The camp served many social, as well as spiritual, functions, Barbara Cook said.
Women’s services proved enlightening for participants.
“At that time women had no rights,” Cook said. “These services were encouraging women to play a more active role in their choice of religion and their participation in religion.”
Missionaries and other visitors came from all points of the globe and spoke about their experiences. One speaker came all the way from China, traveling for 28 days to arrive at Crystal Springs.
When Cook began exploring the grounds, things had quieted down. The age of the huge revivals was over. Even the springs were mostly gone after the dredging of the Dowagiac River in 1928.
But she didn’t mind, and learned to appreciate the serenity.
“You didn’t talk. You listened to the birds and the animals, you enjoyed the beauty and the naturalness of the area,” she said.
That peacefulness is one of the things Stuglik and Cook said makes Crystal Springs unique, along with the tabernacle.
Part of the camp’s mission statement is “removing distractions between our guests and God,” he said.
Crystal Springs has been a big part of Stuglik’s own spiritual journey.
He attended camps there as a kid, and remembers being impressed with the size of the tabernacle.
He gave up a full-time career as a Coloma Township police officer two years ago to live a life “on purpose” as the director of Crystal Springs.
“I joke with friends that God is a lousy driver, but I love where he has brought me,” he wrote in a fundraising letter.
In his time as director, he has seen many young people start out on their own road to God. Crystal Springs also hosts band camps and is becoming a popular wedding location.
Only a few of the original cottages remain. The tabernacle stands as the link between the camp’s past and its future.
People stop in all the time who visited as children, and who have grandchildren attending camp there.
“The tabernacle is the only thing they recognize,” Stuglik said.
Once the structure is fully renovated, Stuglik sees it as an all-weather gathering place, available for whatever the future holds.
“The houses will come and go, the dining hall will come and go, but that building has been the same. Trends change but the building doesn’t. I hope it continues to be the same.”
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