Old Fort Church

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

From the record

“Old Fort Church is an historic African-American Methodist church located on Old Baltimore Pike in Christiana, New Castle County, Delaware. The church was originally built on Schoolbell Road near Christiana in 1850.”
Wikipedia article Old Fort Church, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 411 National Register listings published here for New Castle County · listed in 1983 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building, 1 site as contributing to the listing.
Address. Old Baltimore Pike, Christiana, 19702
When was it listed? August 1983
Category. building
Also known as. White Clay Creek Hundred MRA
Census division. Upper Christiana
National Register reference number. 83001402 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

24 since 2003

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 24 fires within 5 miles of Old Fort Church between 2003 and 2005, burning about 11 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	22
Smoking	1
Equipment and vehicle use	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
22 August 2003	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
23 June 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
8 May 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
5 May 2004	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
21 May 2004	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
26 April 2005	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
22 April 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
22 April 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Delaware State Fire Marshal's Office	not named

Every fire recorded in New Castle County

Mines and quarries near this property

10 of 14 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 14 workings within 5 miles of Old Fort Church: 10 past producers, 3 producers, 1 plant. 4 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Clay, Aluminum. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
New Castle Plant C-E Minerals	Aluminum	Plant
Delaware Brick Co. Pit	Clay	Past Producer
Delaware Brick Co. Pit and Mill	Clay	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Constructors Sand and Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Delaware Sand and Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Delaware Sand and Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Freeway Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Freeway Sand Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Route 40 Farm	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Producer
Whittington Sand & Gravel Pit & Mil	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary

Every working recorded in New Castle County

Storms near this property

8 since 2000

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Christiana, the town this property stands in, in 8 storm reports between 2000 and 2020: 5 thunderstorm wind, 2 flash flood, 1 lightning. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
July 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Christiana	-	Several reports of downed tree limbs and wires were received between Glasgow and Woodshade. Time estimated from radar.
June 2019	Thunderstorm Wind	Christiana	-	Wires down on Cedar Ridge Court. Time estimated from radar.
June 2015	Flash Flood	Christiana	-	Thunderstorms with heavy rain also caused flash flooding in and around Christiana Hundred. Vehicles also became stuck in flood waters. The afternoon and evening event precipitation totals included 2.27 inches at the New Castle County Airport.
September 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Christiana	-	A severe thunderstorm knocked down a few large tree limbs and wires in Christiana Hundred.
June 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Christiana	-	A severe thunderstorm knocked down several trees and wires in and around Christina.
June 2013	Flash Flood	Christiana	-	Heavy rain caused flash flooding along the Christina River. The Christina River at Coochs Bridge was above its 10.5 foot flood stage from 314 p.m. EDT through 609 p.m. EDT on the 18th. It crested at 10.94 feet at 415 p.m. EDT.
May 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Christiana	-	no account filed
August 2000	Lightning	Christiana	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in New Castle County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Public School No. 111-C	under 500 feet	1979
Christiana Historic District	0.2 miles	1974
John Lewden House	0.4 miles	1979
Walnut Lane	1.7 miles	1979
Charles Allen House	1.8 miles	1983
James Stewart Jr. House	2.3 miles	1983

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 83001402 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
New Castle County	All 411 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.