Mt. Moriah African Methodist Church

The Mount Moriah African Methodist Episcopal Church was constructed in 1875 by bridge builder Nathaniel P. Clow. The Gothic Revival style building served as the meeting hall for the First African Methodist Episcopal Church, originally formed in the 1790s, for nearly 100 years. The building was extensively remodeled with fashionable Victorian Gothic embellishments following a violent storm in 1896. In 1970, the meeting hall and its associated parish house were sold to Anne Arundel County. The focus of a lengthy preservation battle, the two-story building was ultimately leased to the Maryland Commission on African-American History and Culture, becoming the state's official museum for African-American history and culture. The museum, opened in 1984, is named in honor of Benjamin Banneker and the abolitionist/orator, Frederick Douglass, both natives of Maryland. Now known as The Banneker-Douglass Museum, Mt. Moriah was listed individually on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.