Location of a Church

CapnJack

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In a typical ranch town in the 1800s, where would the church usually be located at?

Would it be in town, or just on the edge of town?
 

dpaterso

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Edge of town seems like a good bet since it's maybe gonna have a cemetery round the back. Not the kind of thing you want next to the general store. Crazy thought maybe. And yet.

-Derek
 

CapnJack

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Would it have beeen considered a long walk to go to the local church, if it was at the edge of town?
 

dpaterso

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Families would likely ride there in carriages and wagons and suchlike, coming from in the town and places outside town, so I don't think walking or distance would pose problems. But if it suits you to have it in the town, have it in the town, no one's going to say that's unlikely.

-Derek
 

Myrealana

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It depends on how long ago the town was settled.

Basically, once a few houses went up, someone would get the idea of building a church. Sometimes, the church was also the schoolhouse. They'd generally build it on the edge of town, and often, but not always, there was a graveyard behind the church. Sometimes, the church grounds were too rocky for burial, and sometimes, the fact that it was also a school figured into the decision. In that case, the cemetery might be a good walk outside of town.

The thing is, the edge of town doesn't stay the edge for long in a growing community. So, while the church and cemetery might have started out on the edge of town in, say 1840, but 1880, it will be surrounded by other buildings.
 

CapnJack

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It's a ranching community, in rural New Mexico. Probably settled around late 1860s, early 1870s.

It's not a big town. But I don't think it'd be considered a small town. Somewhere in the middle.

It has homes inside the town, but a lot of families also live in the surrounding area.
 

Marlys

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Is it a real town? If so, find out where the churches are, and when they were built. If it's fictional, search out towns in the area that were settled about the time yours is, and see where the first churches were built.
 

gavintonks

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In a typical ranch town in the 1800s, where would the church usually be located at?

Would it be in town, or just on the edge of town?

The church would be in the centre on church street as the congregation it would function as the heart. The church would also be situated on a ley line and may be under a specific constellation like most in Europe. The church would be the gathering place and probably a place of safety and of course the burial ground
 

Jonah Hex

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Honestly, I have never seen (in movies or in original photos of the period) a church into town. They were located outside of town for reasons dpaterson already perfectly wrote (even if some churches were apart from the cemetery, like Bannack -MT- if I'm not wrong). When into big towns, however, the church is always outside of town and surrounded by other (apparently scattered) buildings, but always with a open space around it.
 

dinky_dau

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Spanish-style missions in New Mexico often had orchard lands and short-walled compounds surrounding them; sometimes farming or goat-herds
 

kuwisdelu

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The old Spanish mission in my tribe's village in New Mexico is in the center of the village, with a cemetery in front of it.