Take a look to your right-you’ll spot the proud towers and arches of the First Baptist Church, or as some locals like to call it, “The Bell Towers.” The place looks like something out of old Hollywood, doesn’t it? Hard to believe it’s been around since 1931. Picture Bakersfield in the middle of the Great Depression, folks scraping together a few bucks-well, more like a few hundred, back when a hundred dollars could buy you a used car and leave change for a milkshake. In today’s dollars, building a complex like this would have burned a small fortune, easily running into the millions.
The structure’s done up in reinforced concrete, but the outside? That’s a clever bit of “fake brick”-all poured and designed to *look* old-school sturdy. Top it all off with those red Spanish tiles shimmering in the Bakersfield sun, and you get a real showstopper. That 70-foot bell tower used to echo across downtown on Sundays, calling the faithful-or maybe just folks who liked a bit of drama with breakfast.
There’s a mix of styles here-Romanesque arches stretch up the sides, and that original fellowship hall around the corner brings a bit of the old Mission Revival vibe, with those big, showy arched windows. Even after the 1952 earthquake sent a lot of Bakersfield’s history crumbling, this building survived. It’s basically downtown’s sturdy old cowboy, refusing to budge.
Nowadays, it’s offices, not hymns, filling those halls. But wander near those white oak doors, and you might still catch a little echo of the past.
When you’re ready, take a stroll south for six minutes and you’ll find yourself at the Kern County Hall of Records.
