Albany’s historic Cumberland Church is finally going national. No, not in the franchising sense.
Late last month, organizers behind the church’s restoration efforts got a long-sought victory when the National Parks Service officially placed the 132-year-old building on the National Register of Historic Places.
For Liz Rapp, the decision marks an exciting turnaround. She’s been working on achieving that listing since 2018, back when city was looking to sell the then-neglected property and demolition had even briefly been on the table.
“My parents would be so proud,” she said.
Rapp, a member of the Cumberland Community Events Center board, which has been a driving force behind the church’s preservation and restoration efforts, has put nearly six years of research into achieving a spot on the national registry.
That process required first getting approval from the Oregon State Historic Preservation Office in 2020, and then preparing a new application for federal recognition.
The years of delving into the building’s history, including into the church’s original roster of …