For two centuries, the members of Redbone United Methodist Church have been helping shape Warren County.
On Oct. 26, they will celebrate its 200th anniversary and some of its many members who helped frame the world around them.
The celebration begins at 9:30 a.m. at the church, 43 Burnt House Road, said Sara Carlson Dionne, the church historian and District 4 Election Commissioner.
“We certainly knew that we were steeped in history growing up,” said Carlson who succeeded her mother as church historian.
Among the church’s early membership was David Greenleaf, Mississippi’s first cotton gin manufacturer. Greenleaf is also believed to have been a veteran of the American Revolution.
Some of its former pastors include C.K. Marshall — a member of the Mississippi Hall of Fame — and Charles Galloway, who went on to become the Methodist bishop of the state.
“We’ve had quite a few people become pastors in the Methodist churches,” Dionne said.
The original Redbone church — officially named Bethel Methodist Church — was built from logs in 1814 on land donated by local pioneer Moses Evans.
How the church and the Redbone community got their name is up for debate.
“What I’ve always heard — it could be true or it could not be — wen they started digging around it, they found squirrel bones that had turned red. The name just stuck,” said local historian Gordon Cotton, who will be the featured speaker at the church anniversary ceremony.
Another theory is that the high ground the original church was built on was “a red bone” of earth surrounded by fertile dark soil, Dionne said.
In 1854, a brick church was built with donations from brothers Joel and Benjamin Sellers Hullum. Benjamin Hullum, a Presbyterian, donated a quarter of the supplies, and Joel Hullum, a Methodist,  donated three quarters of the supplies, Cotton said.
“The Presbyterians reserved the right to worship there one weekend a month,” Cotton said.
Eventually, the Presbyterian congregation built Yokena Presbyterian Church.
During the Civil War, the church was the headquarters of the Second Wisconsin Cavalry under the command of Maj. Harry Eastman.
“It was a Union hospital during the Civil War, they weren’t well received by the community but they didn’t have a choice,” Dionne said.
After the war, the historic church thrived until it was destroyed by fire in either 1917 or 1918.
The congregation met in a different location for a few years but eventually dispersed. It was re-organized in 1946.
“We average 30 people on a Sunday for morning worship,” Dionne said.