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Mt Salem Methodist Episcopal Church
Saturday, 18 April 2026
We're on our way back from the open house celebration at Roseberry House where earlier today we enjoyed various reenactment activities and an open hearth cooking demonstration. Bill is taking us hither and thither. I am enjoying the splendid flowers on the occasional double pink Kwanzan cherry trees flowering in people's gardens. They are more impressive than the single flowering Yoshino cherries at Branch Brook Park a week and two days ago, and the streets we traverse are much less crowded too.
image courtesy of the National Register of Historic Places in Hunterdon County, New Jersey
The Greek Revival Italianate church on County Road 579 at the intersection of
Mount Salem Road and Salem Road is a sturdy and substantial building. Built
one hundred sixty two years ago, in 1864. Ornamented with its bright red door.
Bill pulls over at the side of the road. It is the Mount Salem ME Church,
It is the flowers in the graveyard that catch my eye.
Spreading mats of color across the turf, moss pink, Phlox subulata, is vigorously in flower.
Let me clarify these two terms. As it is adjacent to the church, this is a graveyard.
A cemetery would be secular, a commercial or community-managed burial ground.
I've seen moss pink in other graveyards. Its popularity might have several reasons. It is evergreen and so is attractive when out of flower, even in winter. As low as it grows, lawnmowers can be run right over the plants for turf maintenance without damaging them. And especially appealing to me, it is native to central and eastern portions of Canada and the United States. Dandelions, on the other hand, are naturalized invaders from abroad that have woven themselves into our countryside.
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Another native, this time it is a tree. I don't recall ever having seen sassafras in bloom previously. Dioecious, sassafras
has male and female flowers on separate trees. Aromatic and spicy, dried powdered leaves are used to thicken gumbo.
Roots of Sassafras albidum used to be used in making root beer but the saffrole they contain is considered carcinogenic.
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Just admire the ironwork of the gateposts for the fence. Magnificent! Clearly done by a master craftsman.
Browsing online I discovered that this Methodist Episcopal church and adjoining graveyard served the area farmers until 1962. A true country church, services were probably sporadic as this structure is a good 2 or 3 miles from any real town. By the late 1950s early 1960s services were held once a month - the last program is dated April 8, 1962 and states "the next service will be May 13, 1962." That service, for reasons unknown, was never held. The building was vacant until the 1980s when the property was deeded to the Township and the Alexandria Township Historical Society was formed and restored the building. Mt. Salem ME Church was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 19, 1988. It is now used for occasional meetings and weddings.
I shall try to make a return visit in the fall, to see the sassafras in its autumn foliage.
And learn, if there are or are not berries, if the flowers I saw in April were male or female.
If you have any comments or questions, you can e-mail me: jgglatt@gmail.com
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