Hopewell Friends Meeting House (Frederick County, Virginia)
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Hopewell Friends Meeting House
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Hopewell Friends Meeting House, September 2011
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| Nearest city | Clear Brook |
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| Coordinates | 39°15′23″N 78°06′55″W / 39.256389°N 78.115278°WCoordinates: 39°15′23″N 78°06′55″W / 39.256389°N 78.115278°W |
| Area | 8 acres (3.2 ha) |
| Built | 1759–1761 (original) 1788–1794 (expansion) |
| Built by | Thomas McClun |
| NRHP Reference # | 80004190 |
| VLR # | 034-0006 |
| Significant dates | |
| Added to NRHP | March 28, 1980 |
| Designated VLR | November 15, 1977 |
Hopewell Friends Meeting House is an 18th-century Quaker meeting house located the northern Frederick County, Virginia one mile west of the community of Clear Brook at 604 Hopewell Road (formerly State Route 672). Clear Brook, VA 22624. This community was the home of Thomas William "Tom" Fox (1951–2006), a Quaker peace activist, affiliated with Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) murdered in 2006 in Iraq.
Hopewell Friends Meeting was named "Opeckan", after nearby Opequon Creek, when it was set off from the Concord (Pennsylvania) Quarterly Meeting in 1734. It is the oldest Quaker meeting in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. The original group of settlers came from the Monocacy valley in Frederick County, Maryland. Initially, this meeting was a member of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. At that time, the settlement included about seventy families. Initially, a log meeting house was built on lands originally granted by Lt. Gov. William Gooch of Virginia to two Irishmen, a Quaker named Alexander Ross (in 1730) and Morgan Bryan (a 1732 grant to this Presbyterian). Prominent London Quaker John Fothergill (1712-1780) visited this meeting in 1736. In 1757, the 1734 meeting house burned. In addition to losing its place of worship, the congregation also lost all its early records in a 1759 house fire.
Thomas McClun acted as builder for the original 33 feet x 44 feet coursed rubble limestone structure. Located at “the gate of the Shenandoah Valley”, this meeting prospered and increased. From 1789 until 1794, the western 30 x 30 addition nearly doubled the size of Hopewell Meeting House. The National Register Nomination Form described the interior thus:
The interior of the meeting house consists of a large open space with a tiered gallery on the south and west walls. The balcony retains early benches with scrolled ends. Enclosed stairs, side by side, ascend from the center of the south wall. Large posts, some squared, some turned, support the gallery at various points. The main floor has early benches with open backs and some later, standard church-type benches. A platform with additional benches is against the north wall facing the congregation area. As might be expected the effect of the interior is exceedingly plain; the walls and ceiling are plastered and the openings are devoid of ornamental trim.
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