Louisa’s Bright Hope Baptist Church earns historic recognition after community members pitched in with research

Bonnie Newman Davis/Charlottesville Tomorrow

Rev. Damaro Robinson, minister of Bright Hope Baptist Church in Louisa County, delivers a sermon on Nov. 2, 2025. The church was recently approved for designation on the Virginia Landmarks Register. “It’s been a very lengthy process, and a lot of people have really worked hard for it,” said Robin Patton, a retired environmental engineer who assisted with research and helped submit the 153-page nomination. Bonnie Newman Davis/Charlottesville Tomorrow

On a crisp Sunday morning in early November, about two dozen worshippers at Bright Hope Baptist Church clapped and shouted “Amen” as Rev. Damaro Robinson reminded the congregants that by standing firm in their faith, “other doors are already open and waiting for you to come through.” 

Bright Hope Baptist’s members are accustomed to their church opening its doors to the community during uncertain times. After being established in 1882 by freedmen and freedwomen in Louisa County during the Reconstruction era after the Civil War, the church soon became more than a place of worship. Historical records reflect how the white, Gothic Revival-style structure has long educated Black youth, provided holiday meals to local residents and hosted revival meetings offering prayer, preaching and songs. 

On Sept. 18, Bright Hope Baptist Church and Cemetery’s legacy of leadership, cultural preservation and opening doors was recognized when the Commonwealth’s Board of Historic Resources approved it for designation on the Virginia Landmarks Register (VLR). The VLR is Virginia’s official list of places of historic, architectural, archaeological and cultural significance.

Members of the church’s congregation are elated by the news.

Lisa Aaron, Bright Hope’s secretary and Sunday service videographer, proudly noted the influence of Rev. Fountain M. Perkins, the church’s first ordained pastor who served Bright Hope after the church was established.  

Before leading Bright Hope, Perkins spoke at political meetings and was considered a candidate for the Constitutional Convention of 1867–1868, the first election in which Virginia’s African American men could vote, according to the Virginia House of Delegates Clerk’s Office. In 1869, he won one of the county’s two seats in the House of Delegates. “He voted to ratify the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution, which the state was required to do before being re-admitted to the United States,” according to his biography published on the clerk’s office website.

Perkins did not run for reelection in 1871, but remained active in local politics and served as an election judge, the clerk’s office further states.

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