A Neighbourhood in Search of Salvation

Here's a great article published in the Nanaimo Daily News that tells some of the old history of ET Family Church (Evangelistic Tabernacle). You can catch the full story here.

Like the street it is built on, the building at 25 Victoria Rd. has gone from modest to rowdy to downright seedy. Some hope turning the 117-year-old building into a performing arts centre will return the area to respectability once again.

People came to 25 Victoria Rd. to drink beer, meet friends and dance to music that echoed through the streets on Saturday nights.

They also came to worship their Lord and saviour on Sunday mornings.

Some longtime residents think the modest, 117-year-old building has a split personality, serving as a well-respected church for decades before showing its wild side in the seventies as one of the hottest nightclubs in Nanaimo.

Pastor Wayne Nelson knows this better than most people his own history is contained with the building's walls.

Nelson was introduced to the word of God there as child in the early 1970s, temporarily "fell away" from his faith while partying in the building as a teenager, and later as an adult helped return the historic place to its original purpose as a place of worship in 1996. That was after it was a bar for more than two decades.

The symbolism isn't lost on Nelson.

"It was like God was taking back the land. . .a declaration that he isn't finished with Nanaimo," said the Mountain Eagle Church pastor, as he looked up at the building, still bearing the cross from when it served as a place of worship last spring.

Not everyone thinks that the building's 20-year nightclub phase was bad for the community. Former bar staff say it livened up the street and, combined with the now-closed Caprice Theatre next door, created a destination spot for entertainment in Nanaimo.

But over the years, things have changed. That strip of Victoria Road has earned an unsavoury reputation for being a hangout for drug dealers and sex-trade workers.

Now, residents and city officials hope a plan to transform 25 Victoria Rd. into a performing arts centre - slated to open Nov. 28 - will bring back some of the street's appeal while revitalizing the neighbourhood.

It's a day Nelson awaits with pride.

The building was born out of controversy in 1892, when members of the St. Paul's Anglican Church split from the main congregation and built St. Alban the Martyr at 25 Victoria Rd.
Homes began to sprout on either side of a seven-block stretch of land bordered by Nicol Street and Victoria Road years before the first cornerstone was laid at St. Alban. The strip of land was once an active coal reserve, delaying development until 1891.

Even in its early years, this part of Nanaimo - often criticized today for having to carry more than its fair share of social services for addicts and the homeless - was defined by service-providers, including a fire hall, schoolhouse and church, rather than being a commercial-heavy area.

The Anglican fallout out didn't last long. By 1903 the church was closed when members rejoined St. Paul's.

Details on what exactly happened to 25 Victoria Rd. after that aren't clear, but it likely continued serving the community as a house of worship. Fire insurance maps from 1930s show that it was operating as a Pentecostal church. Then from 1955 to 1975 the building served as the Evangelistic Tabernacle. (*note: I think 1955 was just when we changed our name to ET...)

Its appearance changed considerably during that time. A Nanaimo Daily Free Press article from 1958 details how church members spent three years reconstructing the place. They added a second storey for Sunday school rooms and even dug out the basement by hand. (*note: I've heard stories about dynamite!)

"The reconstruction has been so extensive as to constitute in effect the construction of an entirely new church," reads the article.

Towards the end of the Tabernacle's days, Nelson attended Sunday school with his mother there nearly every week. It became a defining part of his childhood.

"I have memories as a child doing Christmas plays in there," said Nelson, a towering man with a deep, booming voice.

But when the Evangelistic Church left the street for its current location on Princess Royal Road, the aged building that had served as a religious haven for more than 80 years was about to change.

The doors would now be shut on Sunday mornings, but open to the crowds on Saturday nights.
For Nelson, the building's transformation into a nightclub symbolized the years he lost touch with his faith as a teenager, often frequenting the club to party with friends.

But for others, after the old church was renovated it became one of the most exciting places in town.

The party spot had a number of different names over the years - best known as the old Wichita North Nightclub - starting in 1975 with the title Shooters, according to City of Nanaimo business license records. Through the years, disco, country and then rock and roll music echoed down Victoria Road, sometimes drawing complaints from neighbours.

Brent Mark worked there for about seven years in the 1990s, when it operated under the well-known Wichita moniker.

"I had a blast working there," said Mark, who was employed as the audio engineer, ensuring the sound systems went smoothly for the club's live bands. "It was quite busy, there was a lot of big acts."

He easily rambles off a list of bands that played at the club: Carlene Carter, Prairie Oyster, Colin James.

Also at that time people could catch a movie at the Caprice next door, or have dinner at a nearby restaurant - other amenities that secured Victoria Road's reputation as a fun place to be in Nanaimo.

Toward the end of his time working at the Wichita, Mark started to notice that the neighbourhood was changing; sex-trade workers began plying their trade further up the road, for example. But the area remained a hot spot right up to about 1997, when the building's role as a piece of Nanaimo's nightlife ended.

Mark hopes a new performing arts centre will bring some of that excitement back.

"There was a whole different feel to it (Victoria Road) back then compared to now," said Mark.
With the nightclub gone, Nelson saw a perfect opportunity to "take back the land."

The Southside Christian Fellowship, later becoming Eagle Mountain Church, had bounced between locations for years until members purchased 25 Victoria Rd. - the church's first and, so far, only permanent location.

Renovating the building was especially satisfying for Nelson.

Most of the interior was painted in dark, gloomy colours, he said, and "tearing out all that black" had special significance to him. He was taking down something that represented a darker part of his life.

"It was quite a profound moment for me," said Nelson, who added that church members even gutted the bar's beer cooler and turned it into a nursery.

"My heart went out to the neighbours when we first bought it. They were coming out and thanking us with open arms because of all the grief they had over the years with it being a nightclub, the loud noise at all hours of the night."

From then on, until the building was sold last spring, it was the site of Christmas plays and Thanksgiving dinners, Sunday services and even a place where a homeless person could sometimes grab a meal or get out of the cold.

"We grew more as a tight-knit group," said Nelson.

In 2002-03, Nelson said that the once-pleasant neighbourhood took on a different dynamic.
"Definitely it changed, there was a lot more street activity happening. Even right out front of the church for a period of time there was open drug deals," he said, adding that the situation became better thanks to the efforts of the RCMP.

But such activity wasn't why Eagle Mountain Church moved to the Southgate Mall last spring, he said. The new higher-traffic venue makes their church more accessible for people and provides more suitable parking.

But one day, the congregation hopes to purchase another church and develop the same sense of community they had on 25 Victoria Rd.

Despite the screams of power tools and a few drywall dust-covered building materials scattered in front of the stage, Camela Tang said she can feel the history within the walls of 25 Victoria, now called Nanaimo Centre Stage.

"It has a lively feel to the place," she said with a smile.

Tang, president of the Centre for the Arts Nanaimo, said the renovations are needed to ensure the structure meets building code requirements, is wheelchair accessible and also conforms to the layout required for a performing arts centre. A box office has already been constructed as well as a "green room" for actors.

Preserving the history of the building is a major part of the renovations, said Tang.

"Not only do we want to improve that, we want to enhance it," she said. "The people of Nanaimo invested a lot of time and had a lot of fun in this building, and we're definitely bringing that back."

The City of Nanaimo paid $460,000 to purchase the former church last spring. Since then, the centre has been undergoing modifications, at an estimated cost of $150,000.

The purchase made headlines when outgoing mayor Gary Korpan called the building "earthquake bait" that would cost the taxpayer a large amount of cash to repair and maintain. The comments drew the scorn of residents in the area and arts groups, which maintain that a small performing arts space is needed.

But such a centre might benefit more than Nanaimo's culture.

Russell Thomson has been done business in this neighbourhood since 1988.

Most homes around 25 Victoria Rd. no longer house longtime residents; they've moved out over the past five years, he said. Lower property values have drawn more transient residents.

Just up the street from the old church, a billboard advertises a house and adjacent empty lot for sale. It's been there for a while.

"It's cheap stuff to buy, so it gets bought and sold bought and sold," he said.

Thomson thinks the street really started to change when the methadone clinic opened on Nicol Street in 2003. But he doesn't blame that service for social problems facing the area. In fact, things are better than they once were.

Still, he can't wait until the theatre opens and draws a new crowd of people into the neighbourhood.

Pamela Shaw, geography instructor at Vancouver Island University, previously told the Daily News that putting performing arts centres in downtown areas that need revitalization has worked for other communities.

"This could add a new dimension to that neighbourhood, now you have people who will be in that neighbourhood during the day as office workers, in the evening as theatre patrons. That's what changes the whole dynamic of the street," she said.

Shaw references urban critic Jane Jacobs's "eyes on the street" theory, that crime can be reduced by having more people in a specific area.

Wayne Nelson wouldn't have it any other way. He said that if Eagle Mountain Church wasn't able to sell their church for what he sees as a positive community-building function, like a performing arts centre, the church wouldn't have sold it at all.

"That area needs more good things happening," he said.