NEWS RELEASE

For Release no later than May 12, 2020

Reverend Dell Rose
Celebrates 50 Years as Founding Pastor
of The First Apostolic Church of Lompoc

May 22-24, 2020

           Lompoc, California — When Lompoc had just over 25,000 population and less than three streetlights, in February of 1970, Reverend Dell Rose and along with his wife, Dorothy Jo, founded The First Apostolic Church of Lompoc.  As prominent Apostolic evangelist preaching and singing across the US, Rose, in late 1969, held a revival in Santa Maria, California, and the pastor there, Reverend Pence, along with several local families, asked Reverend Dell Rose, to begin an Apostolic work in Lompoc.

The Anniversary Services

Pastor Rose will be officially inducted into the Apostolic Ministerial Hall of Fame, Apostolic Archives International, Inc., Joplin, Missouri, at 1:30 PM, Saturday, May 23, 2020, during the 50^th Anniversary Celebration of The First Apostolic Church of Lompoc, 921 North “O” Street, May 22-24, 2020.

Church History

In 1970 and for the first five years church services were held in various Lompoc locations, including the Del Norte Recreation Center, Knights of Columbus building on Chestnut Ave., Mexican Baptist Church on Hickory Ave. and lastly, what was then the Godwin Music Studio in the Laurel Ave. Shopping Center.

The Building

The members of the church in 1975 purchased the front 4+ acres from the Lerned Ranch, located on the corner of North Avenue and North “O” Street and the church building was completed in 1976. The Key to Learning School annex, named “Ruth’s Kitchen” after the late Ruth Sickler, -a faithful volunteer who helped in many church fundraising projects- was completed in 1987.  The roof was raised on the original flat roofed church building in 2008 and topped with Spanish tiles gleaned from the former Lompoc Ford building that was dismantled to make way for the new Hilton Gardens Hotel.

The Early Years

As a 3-year-old, the 12th child of an Oklahoma ranching couple Angeline and Dillard Rose, Rose came with his parents, his siblings and most of their belongings in a panel truck. Dillard Rose and the older children stopped to pick cotton on the way to California during the Oklahoma dustbowl, they finally settled in Kern County, California.

While attending elementary school, when asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, the young Rose, wrote that he would like to become a minister of the gospel.

As a young man, Rose traveled around the world before he was 21 while serving almost four years in the U.S. Navy, and seeing some combat in the Korean War.

Rose was professional country western singer in Bakersfield area in the 1950s. Dell Rose and Dorothy Jo Peddy were married in Weedpatch, California, on October 8, 1954, recently celebrating their 65^th wedding anniversary.

For years, Rose’s favorite pastime was raising Paso Fino horses on his small ranch outside Lompoc.

The church under Pastor Rose’s direction supported many works in Brazil, India and the Philippines.

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