EBENEZER AME

CHURCH
1989 EAGLE SCOUT
PROJECT
Dan Baker
Exton Troop 65
BACKGROUND
 Whose Eagle Scout Project was this?
 My name is Dan Baker and I grew up on Ashlawn Road in East
Whiteland Township, Chester County, PA with my parents Patrick and
Jeanine, and my 4 brothers and 2 sisters. I was 17 years old and a
member of Exton Troop 65 when I selected the Ebenezer AME
Church for my Eagle Scout project. I am now 51 years old and living
in Carmel Valley in San Diego, CA with my wife Alexandra, daughter
Katerina, and dog Bilka.
 Why did you select the Ebenezer AME Church for your project?
 I grew up hiking and biking (and then driving) around the area and I
was fascinated by all of the historical sites. We lived up the street
from the Ashlawn Mansion and I had visited the old Gunkle Spring
Mill many times (sometimes without permission). My family and
scout troop had also visited several of the Civil War era parks
including Valley Forge, Gettysburg, and Antietam. I was fascinated by
the small, old cemeteries in my neighborhood, such as the Union Hall
cemetery on Flat Road, and toured the local area looking for
interesting sites for an Eagle Scout Project. Not knowing what it was,
I stumbled on the site and remains of the building while driving back
from fishing at Marsh Creek one day. I had no idea it was a church
and cemetery at the time!
PROJECT MEMORIES
 What was it like to work on the project?
 It was a huge project and took the efforts of my entire family and most
of my scout troop to clear the site, which was completely overgrown
with trees, vines, and thorn bushes. I don’t remember exactly how long
it took, something like 10 to 15 full 8+ hour days over 3 or 4 months,
working only with hand tools, clippers, saws, hatches, and axes. There
were many scrapes, thorns and needles, poison ivy, and mosquitoes
involved.
 When did you discover that it was a church and cemetery?
 It wasn’t obvious at first because we could only see the stone building
and none of the gravestones were visible in the jungle of overgrowth.
But as we cleared more of the site, we started coming across
gravestones that had markings with people and dates back to the 1800s.
We were thrilled every time we found a new gravestone, and it quickly
became obvious that we were working on the sacred ground of a
church. Only later, while doing research at the Chester County Library,
did I find out the name of the Ebenezer AME Church and realize that I
had come across something important and wonderful in the history of
the township.
PROJECT MEMORIES
 How did you create the map of the cemetery?
 Remember that 1989 was prior to the Internet and most of the
digital tools that we now have for research, mapping (no Google
Maps or GIS!), and analysis (ground penetrating radar?) did not
exist yet. However, I was a self-professed “computer nerd” and
very capable with the Macintosh SE that we were lucky to have at
home. Without any knowledge of survey tools (now I’m a
professional civil engineer with degrees from Villanova and MIT!),
I hand drew the map at the cemetery, trying to just get relative
position and size of the stones, and then recreated it in a desktop
publishing application on the Mac.
 I understand there are over 40 gravestones on my map (over half?)
that have not been found in the latest survey, but I tried to mark
every stone on the site that appeared significant – not wanting to
miss something that was a marker for an actual grave. I hope future
surveys are able to find and verify many, if not most, of the
gravestones that I was able to document 34 years ago.
PROJECT
MEMORIES
 Anything else you would like to share?
 I’m really proud of this Eagle Scout project, even after all these
years, and I think it’s incredible that there have been multiple
follow-on Scout and archaeology research projects to continue
bringing this sacred site and important history of people in East
Whiteland Township and Chester County to light.
 At the completion of the project, I felt I had reached a dead end
when I contacted and was told there wasn’t any interest in
maintaining the site from the pastor at the closest AME church
Saint Paul’s in Malvern. I filed my report in the Chester County
Library as a way to “put it to rest” until someone else became
interested in this amazing history, sometime in the far future. . .
 That day is here! Thanks to Ms. Bertha Jackmon for finding me
and being interested in my project, as well as all the other
historians, researchers, and scouts who have kept the work going!

 Happy Juneteenth!!