Homeland Methodist Church was established in 1875 as Bethel Methodist Church. The original Bethel Methodist Church stood about a half mile west of the present church site and was a crude structure without refinements or ornamentation. In 1887, the charter members decided to build a more suitable church on property about 500 feet south of its present location. The congregation contributed time, effort, and materials, and after two years of construction the church was completed in 1889. Its first wooden steeple featured a spire created by James B. “Grandpa” Crum, who according to a descendant meticulously carved the spire atop the wooden shingled steeple. That steeple was knocked over during a hurricane in 1946, and because rebuilding it to its original height was too expensive, it was squared off and topped with a cross. In October 1990, an aluminum steeple replicating the shape and height of the original replaced the storm-damaged one. The church served Homeland until the mid-1970s, when it was closed, and it was later donated to the Polk County Board of County Commissioners by Mr. and Mrs. Casey Fletcher and Mr. and Mrs. Donald Wilson, then subsequently donated to the park on May 1, 1986.