A Spring on Property for a Mission Station, Ikot Usen, Nigeria, 1950

"Standing on the edge of the site, you can see a spring which flows at the foot of the large coconut [sic] palm in the center." Another view of a piece of property offered to American missionaries from Churches of Christ by the people of Use Ndon for the purpose of building a mission station. This photograph comes from an album that recounts Eldred Echols and Boyd Reese's visit to Nigeria in 1950. The Lawrence Avenue Church of Christ in Nashville, Texas asked the two missionaries to visit Nigeria and report on an emerging indigenous Christian movement whose leader participated in a Bible correspondence course run by the Tennessee congregation. Upon their arrival, the missionaries found several thousand Christians led by Coolidge Akpan Okon Essien, from the Efik tribe in Eastern Nigeria, whose doctrine and practice were similar to that of American Churches of Christ.