Manuscripts Department
           Library of the University of North Carolina
                         at Chapel Hill

                 SOUTHERN HISTORICAL COLLECTION

                             #4337-z
                     DAVID J. GILMER PAPERS
                            Inventory

Abstract:      David J. Gilmer was an A.M.E. Zion minister and
           director in the 1930s and 1940s of Trinity Mission,
           Greensboro, N.C., a shelter for the homeless.
               Scattered items, ca. 1937-1945, relating to
           Gilmer's activities, primarily the operation of
           Trinity Mission.  Most items are brief letters, many
           of them by Gilmer to the editor of the Greensboro
           Daily News.  Also included are newspaper columns by
           Gilmer, records of contributions to Trinity Mission
           and an annual report on the shelter, and a copy of an
           article about Gilmer and Trinity Mission.

Online Catalog Terms:
   African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church--Clergy.
   Afro-American Methodists--North Carolina.
   Afro-Americans--North Carolina--History--1877-1964.
   Clergy--North Carolina--History--20th century.
   Gilmer, David J., b. ca. 1880.
   Greensboro (N.C.)--Social conditions--20th century.
   Shelters for the homeless--North Carolina--Greensboro--
       History.
   Trinity Mission (Greensboro, N.C.).

Size:  45 items (5 folders).

Provenance:    Purchased from Bookworm & Silverfish (dealer), of
               Wytheville, Va., in November 1982.  The previous
               provenance of this material is not known.

Access:        No restrictions.

Processing Note:   This collection was processed with support
                   from the Randleigh Foundation Trust.  

Copyright:     Retained by the authors of items in these papers,
               or their descendants, as stipulated by United
               States copyright law.

Table of Contents:
       Biographical Note
       Description

                        BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

   David J. Gilmer was born ca. 1880 in the West McCulloch Street
neighborhood in Greensboro, N.C.  In 1900, Gilmer commanded
Company H, 49th Regiment of United States Volunteer Infantry in
the Spanish-American War and was stationed in Mindanao,
Philippine Islands.  In 1926, Gilmer was proprietor of both the
Gilmer Drug Company and the Gilmer Cafe and Sanitary Barbershop
in Greensboro.  He closed the businesses and became an evangelist
between 1926 and 1930.

   In 1931, Gilmer became the assistant pastor of the Trinity
African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church on East Market Street,
Greensboro.  Gilmer assisted attorney Andrew Joyner, Jr., and
Greensboro Mayor Paul C. Lindley to organize Trinity Mission in
January 1931 and located it at Trinity Church.  Around 1935,
Gilmer became superintendent at the Federal Transient Service's
East Market Street Shelter in Greensboro.  By the following year,
he was pastor at St. Philip's A.M.E. Zion Church, Greensboro, and
superintendent at Trinity Mission.  He became pastor at Mt.
Olivet A.M.E. Zion Church, Greensboro, between 1941 and 1942.

   Greensboro city directories indicate that Gilmer had a wife,
Minnie A. Gilmer, and one daughter, Minnie S. Gilmer, a teacher
in Greensboro in the early 1940s.  Gilmer resided in Greensboro
at least until 1948.

                           DESCRIPTION

   This material consists of scattered items relating to
activities of African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church minister
David J. Gilmer during the period 1937-1945, years when he was
concerned primarily with the operation of Trinity Mission, a
shelter for the destitute in Greensboro, N.C.  Most items are
brief letters, many of them by Gilmer to the editor of the
Greensboro Daily News.  Also included are newspaper columns by
Gilmer, records of contributions to Trinity Mission and an annual
report on the shelter, and a copy of an article about Gilmer and
Trinity Mission.

   Correspondence is chiefly of Gilmer with citizens of
Greensboro relating to the work of Trinity Mission.  About half
are letters to the editor for publication in the Greensboro Daily
News in which Gilmer discusses racism, the treatment of
mulattoes, interracial cooperation, social welfare, and other
matters relating to blacks in Greensboro.  Also included are five
letters from the adjutant general's Office of the War Department,
responding to Gilmer's inquiries about his pension and his war
record in the Philippine Islands; two letters from executives of
the Vick Chemical Company, relating to gifts made to Trinity
Mission; and a brief personal note from W. J. Trent (1874-1963),
president of Livingstone College, Salisbury, N.C.

   Writings consist of eleven handwritten drafts of newspaper
columns, three published version of writings, two fragments, and
one brief meditation on scripture, perhaps part of a sermon. 
Eleven of the seventeen items are pieces for Gilmer's "Week-by-
Week" column; three are a part of another series of articles,
"Along Elm Street."  Both series address such topics as social
welfare, immorality, race relations, and the education of African
Americans.  Some, if not all, of the "Week-by-Week" columns
appeared in The Star of Zion, the newspaper of the A.M.E. Zion
Church.

   Other material in this collections includes an annual report
of the Trinity Mission for 1938, an eleven-page volume with
various kinds of entries, and a 1941 article about Trinity
Mission.  The annual report contains statistics on services
rendered and the mission's finances; a list, presumably
incomplete, of contributions is attached.  The volume includes
entries recording contributions, presumably to Trinity Mission;
reflections on scripture, perhaps for a sermon; drafts of letters
to the editor of the Greensboro Daily News; lists of members,
probably members of churches served by Gilmer; and a brief note
on the founding of Trinity Mission.  The article, "Thousands of
Homeless are Helped by Trinity Mission," appeared in the
Greensboro Record, 7 January 1941.