Brother Mac

There used to be a small scraggly blackjack tree in the southeast corner of the Junction Hill Pentecostal Church parking lot. And sometimes of a Sunday evening, when I pull up into the parking lot, it seems there ought to be an old, green, late 40's model, Chevy truck, parked facing south under that tree. That truck belonged to W. Chester "Chet" McDowell or as we respectfully called him, "Brother Mac".

This is the only quality picture that I could locate of "Brother Mac". I found an email of one of his relatives on the Findagrave.com website and she sent me this photo from a newspaper article. Thank you Leilani Mcdowell for responding and sending me this picture!

Chester McDowell hadn't always been a church goin' man. As a matter of fact, his spiritual awakening came rather late in life. If I have it figured right, it was somewhere around 1959-1960 when he was in his middle fifties.*  As told by Rev. Harold Essary, Brother Mac showed up one day on the doorstep of the **Victoria Mission Church parsonage. He had been drinking and had "ambeer" or tobacco juice running out of both sides of his mouth and down into his beard. Brother Harold brought him into the living room and proceeded to ask him what he needed. Chester informed Brother Harold that he wanted to "get saved". To parlance this phrase, Brother Chet wanted to repent of his sins, receive salvation, receive Christ... be "Born Again". And that is exactly what happened! This big, rough, bearded, old reprobate was adopted into the family of God! According to Brother Harold, this was quite the spectacle to behold, especially for the Essary children!

When Brother Mac appeared at the next service, not only had the inside man been cleaned up, but the outside also. He was scrubbed to a fare-thee-well, had on clean clothes and instead of washing the ambeer out of his beard, he had just shaved it off! Right from the start, he was faithful to church and sat right on the front row.

When Brother Essary left Victoria Mission and plans were underway to build a new church, Brother Mac had a visit with him. Brother Mac lived on eighty acres west of Victoria Mission and since he no longer farmed or pastured it, he had a proposition for the new church project. He would sell seventy of the eighty acres, keeping ten acres including his house. With the money from the sale of land, he would buy land for the new church and pay for the fencing around it. This was certainly acceptable to Brother Harold and the church, so the land was sold and property purchased from Leo Nolte at Junction Hill. As I sit here and type this out, I get tears in my eyes, thinking of the reward that Brother Mac is STILL receiving in Heaven because he had a vision and a generous heart!

When I remember Brother Mac, he was up in years. He still drove to church, sat on the front pew on the right side of the sanctuary and clapped to the music with a slow (out of time!) rhythm. Did I mention that he sat on the front pew on the righthand side? Yes, that was His place! If someone visiting happened to take his hallowed place, it took him a couple of service to get over it! He would sit farther back and "pout" but eventually "get over it" and all was well again.

One of Brother Mac's unique talents was whittling and wood carving. He had a little building just west of his house that he used for his hobby. Most everyone in the church was at one time or another, a recipient of one of his crafts. It seems the most popular one by far was a little fan. It was carved out of a single piece of wood, with separate "fins" and a little handle with a hand carved chain attached. The fins were sewn together with a neat stitch and also sewn at the base of the handle. The ends of the fins were carved with a decorative pattern. I had one of these fans years ago but like a lot of things that you don't think are too important in your childhood, it was lost. The picture below is of one that was given to my sister-in-law, Lisa Riggs. It doesn't have the little chain on the handle but the rest is like I just described.

When you ask any of the children that were around when Brother Mac was alive "What do you remember most about him?". Almost invariably the answer is "He handed out candy to us kids!" When the kids from the area churches would visit, they always would make their way to the "Candy Man". We never called him that but perhaps they didn't know his real name. My Mom told about Brother Mac giving my brother Ralph a piece of candy one day, and he got choked on it. Mom slapped around on Ralph, stuck her finger down his goozle and finally dislodged the..."Lifesaver". Brother Mac was looking on and commented in his gruff way, "Well, he could still breath cause that Lifesaver had a hole in it..." That was just Brother Mac!

One day Brother Mac came to Brother Essary with a scripture he had read. The verse was Genesis 2:18 and this was the part that caught his attention; "It is not good for man to be alone." Brother Mac was a lifelong bachelor but figured since he was now a Christian, he should follow the scripture commands...and get married! I don't think Brother Essary was too keen on the idea and tried to talk him out of it. But evidently, Brother Mac had already been spying out the land because it wasn't but a few weeks and he had found "Birdie". Brother Harold married them (very hesitantly) and for awhile they lived in wedded bliss. But sadly, it didn't last too long. In just a few months, they separated and divorced. Brother Mac kept coming to church and didn't lose his faith over the whole ordeal.

When Brother Mac passed away, one of his funeral requests was quite unusual.

Every Sunday at Junction Hill, we had (and still have) the "Booster Band". All the children from walking age to seven or eight years old, would line up by the altars (boys on one side, girls on the other) and someone would lead them in simple children's songs. It started with; "We are the Gospel Booster Band. We come to you each Sunday Morn. We extend to you a welcome hand! So won't you come and join our Gospel Booster Band! We're gonna fight! fight! fight! all sinfulness. Until we prove to you our usefulness. Were gonna push the De-vil in his grave! In his Grave! and Shout! Shout! Shout!" There were other songs like "Root Them Out", "I'd rather be a little thing climbing up (than a big thing tumbling down!)" and the old standard "Jesus Love Me".

The Booster Band was the highlight of Brother Mac's life. He would smile and clap and for a few brief minutes, perhaps become a child again... So...At his funeral, all of the children that could (myself included even though I was ten) lined up in front of the casket, and sang Booster Band songs! It seemed to fit just right...

Brother Mac has been gone for well over forty years, and most folks, even at Junction Hill, do not remember him. But I hope this little blog post gives someone a little more information and appreciation for the "Un-sung Heroes" of our church. I am a blessed man to have the memories that I do of Chester "Chet" "Brother Mac" McDowell.

*All of my information is from conversations through the years with the first Pastor of the Junction Hill Pentecostal Church, Rev. Harold Essary. With memory being the fickle thing it is, feel free to comment with your memories and I will make corrections as necessary.

**One other thing. Brother Essary pastored the Victoria Mission Church at Cull from 1959 until he was asked to leave in 1963. It was then that he and most of the congregation left to form the Junction Hill Church.

Joy Barnett Collins kept the little fan that she received from Brother Mac. It is shown in the picture above with the little ring carved at the end of the handle.

If anyone else has a "Brother Mac" fan, send me a picture and I'll add it to this post. thebigparson@gmail.com