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The AME, African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church grew out of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the early 1800s. See the section titled Methodist Episcopal Church / United Methodist Church.
The Mt Pisgah AME Zion Church was one of the congregations formed in western Pennsylvania as early as the 1840s. According to the sketch presented in The Kernel of Greatness, the Bedford congregation was formed in 1845. The name Mt Pisgah was derived from the Mount Pisgah on which the prophet Balaam gazed upon the Israelites and refused to curse God's blessed people as requested by Balek. When it was formed, the Bedford congregation numbered about thirty-seven. The first church edifice was a log structure located on Gravel Hill, to the west of the Penn and West Streets intersection. The deed for that property was made out in 1855, but not recorded in the Court House until 1866. Frederick and Eve Naugle sold the property to the Wesleyan Methodist Episcopal Zion Church of Bedford for the sum of $1 The 1877 Beers Atlas shows 'African Church' just within the Borough boundary. In the 1880s, the congregation moved to a new wood frame structure on the northeast corner of West and John Streets, where it is located today.
The African Methodist Episcopal Church was incorporated in 1883.
