\u201cWe tend to have a habit of letting these folks go, and then coming back and recognizing them later,\u201d said Lisa Challenger, executive director of Beach to Bay Heritage Area<\/a>, which received a grant for the mural. \u201cBut we get there. I guess that\u2019s the important part.\u201d<\/p>\n Philadelphia, where he led a church from 1902 to 1932, long ago honored Tindley. The church, which once claimed 12,500 members, was renamed Tindley Temple<\/a>. It\u2019s credited as the nation\u2019s first megachurch. <\/p>\n Today, it\u2019s a vibrant hub of Center City, with a jazz cafe and an institute housing his impressive musical archive. After he died in 1933, he was buried at historic Eden Cemetery outside Philadelphia, sharing eternity with a who\u2019s who of Black abolitionists, suffragettes and fellow preachers.<\/p>\n Born around 1851 (the exact date is unclear), Tindley<\/a> spent his childhood between freedom and slavery, in a state where a Black child\u2019s status often was ever-shifting and tenuous. His mother, Hester, was free; his father, Charles Tindley Sr., was enslaved at Joseph Briddell\u2019s plantation south of Berlin. Hester died when Tindley was young. He lived with his mother\u2019s sister until he was old enough to work in the Taylor house, then returned to his father.<\/p>\n With no formal schooling, young Tindley taught himself to read by studying discarded newspaper scraps. He also may have received some training from the enslaver Calvin B. Taylor, namesake of the Berlin museum.<\/p>\n Tindley often told the story of when, as a boy, he felt compelled to worship and walked 5 miles to pray at his father\u2019s church. He hid until the pastor asked children who could read the Bible to approach. Tindley emerged from his hiding place and read, flawlessly. Those who witnessed the incident called him \u201cthe Barefoot Boy of Berlin.\u201d<\/p>\n Tindley met his wife, Anna Daisy Henry, in Berlin, and in 1880 they moved to Philadelphia. He started working as a janitor in the church he eventually led. He took night classes and became an ordained minister in 1887. He served throughout Delaware and on Maryland\u2019s Eastern Shore before returning to Philadelphia in 1902.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was known as \u2018Mr. Delaware Conference,\u2019\u201d said the Rev. Emanuel L. Johnson, a longtime Eastern Shore pastor, referring to the religious organization for Methodist ministers. \u201cHe wrote more than 900 hymns. Five of them are in our current hymnal. He was a leader and a great man of faith.\u201d<\/p>\n Among those songs was \u201cI\u2019ll Overcome Someday<\/a>,\u201d which gospel arrangers Atron Twigg and Kenneth Morris later turned into the civil rights anthem \u201cWe Shall Overcome.\u201d Pete Seeger performed the song, and protesters sang it at sit-ins and strikes throughout the turbulent 1950s and 1960s.<\/p>\n In Berlin, Tindleys honored their famous relative by singing his hymns in church. The larger community, though, had no idea how the Eastern Shore shaped the man whom author Ralph Jones called the \u201cPrince of Preachers\u201d in a 1983 biography. (Tindley\u2019s son E.T. Tindley possibly coined the name first; he published a biography called \u201cThe Prince of Colored Preachers\u201d in 1942.) <\/p>\n When Challenger learned her organization had received a $110,000 state grant in 2021, she knew the time had come to honor him.<\/p>\n Worcester County had come a long way by then. The county had settled a discrimination lawsuit<\/a>, which led to political redistricting \u2014 and the first Black county commissioner. The Germantown School<\/a>, which Black children attended for decades, was restored and became a community center and exhibit space. <\/p>\n Diana Purnell, the county\u2019s second Black commissioner, felt that Tindley\u2019s time had come.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s all a part of Berlin, a part of history,\u201d she said. \u201cWe have to always keep our history in front of people.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/F5HCQY6FKZGW3JDCFFC7W3GVWI.jpg\")
The massive organ at Tindley Temple in Philadelphia, where Charles Albert Tindley was a pastor for many years. (Rona Kobell\/The Banner)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/WL6MG5RZJFBS5MAQ2XNCPJ3F6U.jpg\")
The Rev. Charles Albert Tindley\u2019s face is projected at the church in Philadelphia where he rose from janitor to pastor. (Rona Kobell\/The Banner)<\/p>\n