Presbyterian Church in Fairfield sold

FAIRFIELD — The First United Presbyterian Church in Fairfield has been sold, but the new owners will allow the congregation to continue to gather there.

The new owners are Tammy Haessler and Adriene Crimson, who will live on the second floor and rent out space in the rest of the church for special events. Their nonprofit organization that will manage the building is called Golden Magnolia, and in addition to hosting gatherings, they hope to convert a portion of the church into a soup kitchen. Haessler and Crimson said they plan to plant magnolia trees on the property, which they said are found nowhere else in Fairfield.

The church’s congregation is among the oldest in town, founded in 1841, and its sanctuary is 145 years old. At one point in the 1940s, the church had 600 members, but that number has been falling since then and finally reached a point where the church council decided it was time to sell the building.

Sally Johnston, the communications chair of the church’s council, said Sunday worship service draws “30 people on a good day,” and that the church has 90 members on the books. She said selling the building has been “in the back of our minds for the past 10 years.” Deb Doyle, president and chair of evangelism, said paying for maintenance is hard with less and less revenue each year.

By January 2019, the church’s council, called a “session,” agreed it was time to act. They didn’t want to think of it as downsizing, but rather “right-sizing,” as Johnston said. The session has done a lot of work on the church in recent years, fixing its roof and updating its 11 furnaces.

“She’s a gorgeous old lady, but she’s demanding,” Johnston said of the building.

Haessler and Crimson did not know each other before learning the church was for sale. They both had an interest in moving to a dwelling with a lot of space, and the church fit the bill. Crimson said she knew of people who lived in a converted church, and liked the idea of living in an old Victorian home, so her interest was piqued when a real estate friend, Michaela McLain, told her about the First Presbyterian Church.

“When I saw the basketball court [on the third floor], I felt like Dorothy landing in Oz,” Crimson said.

Haessler has five kids and some pets. She ran a day care from her house for 12 years, so she was particularly excited by the amount of space the church offered.

The new owners said there was never any doubt in their minds that they would allow the congregation to continue using the church.

“We want the congregation to stay as long as they want,” Haessler said. “I get sad thinking about them going elsewhere.”

Johnston said the congregation will pay a fee to Golden Magnolia Inc. to continue using the church. The session has no plans to move the congregation elsewhere, and plans to stay at least through October when the congregation will hold its 180th anniversary celebration.

The sale of the church was effective July 2. The new owners are remodeling the church’s second floor to live there. Johnston and Doyle said that floor hasn’t seen much use in recent years except for one of the rooms serving as a classroom.

In addition to keeping the congregation, Haessler and Crimson will allow other groups to use the church such as the Chamber Singers of Southeast Iowa. They’d like the building to host art walk events, movie nights, roller skating parties on the basketball court and much more. They plan to have the kitchen certified so it can be rented, too.

The new owners hope to have the building ready for rentals in the fall.

“We want to hold a pie and bingo night as soon as we can,” Crimson said.