Updated October 17, 2005 URL is www.tentativetimes.net/05memo/friends.html
Fairmount Friends Meeting
Photographs of the church in which James Dean’s funeral was held on in October 1955.
This is the first time Friends Meeting has given tours to tourists or allowed us to take photographs inside the building (as I understand it.) This tour and reception gives us a better understanding of James Dean’s funeral. Back Creek Friends, Jimmy’s home meeting house, was too small to accommodate the funeral crowd so Fairmount Friends Meeting offered their building.
Here is the church today, right in downtown Fairmount behind the grocery. It’s beautiful.
Facing west inside the church. There is more serenity in here than anywhere else I’ve been.
Looking northwest from the balcony, I’m up where the organ pipes and chimes are. Jimmy’s pallbearers sat up here, since the church and grounds were filled.
Looking north near the pulpit.
Here is the second building, which replaced a Friend’s home that was the original Meeting House. Location is facing the current church.
A stained glass window, added when this newest Meeting House building was built. The building was subsequently enlarged and more windows were added. Here is one below, if I’m not mistaken:
Two stained glass windows on the front, south-facing side of the Meeting House.
Lights are hidden in the arch which resembles praying hands. Another view shows the church as if you were facing south from the pulpit.
This fan signing the guest book came all the way from Viet Nam, where he lives full-time. We hope his wife will accompany him next time he visits. We will welcome her.
It was exciting to meet Gale Hickade (rhymes with chickadee,) the President of the Fairmount Historical Society and a member of Fairmount Friends Meeting. I thought he’d be aloof, but he is a regular a guy as Phil Zeigler or Jim Grindle or Bob Pulley. His wife and daughter were hostesses for this historic event, the first time Friends Meeting has given tours or allowed photographs inside the building. I suppose there is an exception for weddings?
Mr. H. is a fine source to pepper with questions. As soon as I find my literature from the vestibule, I will add more names and dates. I think I loaned out my brain to Hurricane Relief and they misplaced it.
Check back in a couple of weeks for more details.
Thanks for visiting the deaners.net Memories of James Dean’s 50th Death Anniversary
Here’s a link to the deaners.net index
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| Dust and Clay | The Romance of Rebellion | Lyrics for East of Eden |
Poetry and Lyrics by Charles Barnes 
Here’s a link to the index for this year’s Fairmount September James Dean Festival
Here’s a link to the deaners.net index
Here’s the CMG’s James Dean website
Page made by Sandra Weinhardt, email [email protected] I’ll add the corrections of data you send me, but I won’t be lightning-fast.