St. Michael's Episcopal Church -- Amsterdam Avenue and 99th Street

photo nyc-architecture.com

As the 18^th century turned into the 19^th, St. Mark’s in the Bowery was the northernmost church in Manhattan.   Not until the traveler would reach Yonkers would he find another place of worship.  It was a problem for wealthy New Yorkers who dotted the upper island with their grand and extensive country estates.

In 1806 several of the gentlemen, most of whom worshiped at Trinity Church, laid plans to build an Episcopal church in the country.  Oliver H. Hicks donated the site and Trinity Church promised financial aid.  On July 27, 1807 Bishop Moore consecrated the completed building at what today is Amsterdam Avenue and 99^th Street.

An early watercolor depicts a charming rural church.  Wooden and painted white, it featured the open belfry, grassy lawn and picket fence expected in a countryside church erected by well-to-do families.  The list of members included New York’s most prominent families:  Elizabeth Hamilton, widow of Alexander Hamilton;  the Schermerhorns, the De Peysters, the Schieffelin and the Lawrence families among them.  

The 1807 wooden church -- Churchman magazine 1907 (copyright expired)

The little church may have appeared quaint, yet it was anything but inexpensive.  The cost of the first St. Michael’s was $4,959.72—around $90,000 today—of which Trinity Church gave $2,000.  The first pew rents were around $200 per year (about $3,500).   Money was apparently not a great problem for St. Michael’s and in 1827 it was resolved to discontinue the morning and evening collections “as interrupting the solemnity of divine worship and generally unpleasant to the congregation.”

In 1853 the pew rents were abolished altogether.  The same year the wooden church building was destroyed by fire.  A second building costing $12,611.70 was quickly built on the same site—also of wood and slightly larger.  The new church could seat 400, double the number of worshipers as the former church.

In the meantime the neighborhood was experiencing more development.   In 1859 there had been 21 baptisms at St. Michaels, in 1863 there were 199.  In 1864 gas lighting was introduced and the rector’s salary was increased to $3,500 due to the “increased cost of living.”

The 1854 Carpenter Gothic church was twice the size of the earlier building.

When the Civil War broke out, St. Michael’s was shuttered and locked, not to be reopened until the end of the conflict.  The work of the church, however, continued through outreach programs and work with the needy and sick.  St. Michael’s was the first church to provide Christian burial for the poor and its Charity School became the first public school on the West Side of Manhattan.  The Churchman, in 1907, would remember “The work of the Church among the miserable and abandoned in the hospitals, the almshouses, the asylums and the prisons of New York, the work of the Church in the slums, the rescue for the fallen women, and forsaken children, all of these began in St. Michael’s.”

As the century drew to a close, Amsterdam Avenue had become a major thoroughfare and the Upper West Side experienced an explosion of new homes and businesses.  The arrival of the elevated railway in 1879 made the area conveniently accessible.  By 1889 a new church building was imperative.  Robert W. Gibson was awarded the commission for the structure and he delivered a surprising yet remarkable design.

The cornerstone was laid by Bishop Potter on St. Michael’s Day, September 29, 1890.  The walls began rising around the still-standing older church over the old cemetery.  The day after the cornerstone laying, The New York Times noted that “In the excavations for the foundations a number of old vaults have been brought to light.  The doors of three of these were to be seen yesterday in a bank of earth just back of the platform surrounding the cornerstone.  It is intended to preserve these vaults, it was said yesterday, and to build the church over them.”

The new church begins rising around the still-standing 1854 St. Michael's -- Churchman magazine 1907 (copyright expired)

The building was expected to be completed in September 1891; however that date came and went and work dragged on.  Finally, on December 15 the still-unfinished church was consecrated.   The New York Times remarked on the status of construction.  “While the church was still far from being complete, the rood-screen not being in place for the consecration services, the pulpit, lectern, and altar being but temporary structures, the organ being only partially finished, the walls undecorated, and the windows wanting in memorial gifts, sufficient was nevertheless disclosed to make it assured that the new Saint Michael’s…will eventually be one of the finest houses of worship in this vicinity, if not in the country.”

photo by America's Roof

Clad overall in rough-cut Indiana limestone it harmoniously combined historic styles. The Romanesque Revival, bowed chancel section on 99^th Street nestles against a soaring Florentine campanile 160 feet tall.  Unlike nearly every other Romanesque building of the time, which were built of brownstone or red brick, St. Michael’s gleamed in its white stone.  When completed at a cost of $183,000 including furnishings the church could seat up to 1,600.

King’s Handbook of New York City called the new building “a noteworthy instance of modern intelligent ecclesiastical architecture.”

The “walls undecorated” that The Times made mention of would be worth the wait.  Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company was given the job of decorating the interior and the project would be a long one.  Between 1893 and 1907 the firm headed by Louis Comfort Tiffany lavished the chancel area with mosaics, a Vermont marble altar, the pulpit, altar rail and glass reredos.  

The magnificent chancel window in seven sections, each twenty-five feet high, depicted “St. Michael and all the Host of Heaven.”  Executed by Tiffany artisans Edward P. Sperry, Joseph Lauber, Louise J. Lederle and Clara W. Parrish, Palette; Bench magazine termed the group “the most important window in the country.”

photo episcopalchurch.org

But Tiffany’s work ground to a halt and the main sanctuary was left unadorned.    In 1922 the firm was called back to decorate the Chapel of the Angels.  A large mosaic mural behind the chapel altar was installed, as well as two additional stained glass windows.  It was the end of Tiffany’s work at St. Michael’s, leaving the drab main sanctuary in marked contrast to the vivid Tiffany sections.

The Upper West Side continued to grow and in 1899 the Third Avenue Railway Company began plans to lay train tracks up the center of Amsterdam Avenue alongside an already-existing set.   Pastor Dr. John P. Peters would not have it.

Peters raised money and recruited what The Outlook magazine termed “a few conscientious anti-monopolists” in a lawsuit against the railroad.  The magazine insisted that “New York City has not in years been so stirred by an anti-corporation campaign as by the present one.”   Peters intended to fight against “turning the attractive street into a dangerous car-yard.”

In March 1899 the Supreme Court of New York heard the case of “The St. Michael’s Protestant Episcopal Church in the City of New York, Plaintiff, v. The Forty-Second Street, Manhattanville and St. Nicholas Avenue Railway Co., Defendant.”   The feisty preacher won.

St. Michael's in 1895 - Nickerson's Illustrated Church, Musical and School Directory of New York and Brooklyn (copyright expired)

One of the wealthy parishioners of St. Michael’s in the first years of the 20^th century was Margaret E. Zimmerman.    The widow of John E. Zimmerman and an heiress in her own right –her father William Ponsonby Furniss was known as the “West Indian merchant prince"--she had a falling out with her family. 

When Margaret’s father died in 1871 he left his three sons and three daughters his fortune, including over 200 undeveloped lots in the Riverside Drive area.  By the early 20^th century that land was highly valuable as mansions began rising along the newly-finished Riverside Park.   In 1916 only the 84-year old Margaret, now an invalid, remained alive among the heirs, having inherited their shares as each died.

When relatives insisted on an accounting of the original trust funds, the referee concluded that Margaret’s sisters had made unauthorized investments under the law and charged Margaret $257,838 in fines.

Margaret Zimmerman was not pleased.

When the rich woman died in her apartment at 400 Park Avenue in 1918, her relatives discovered they had all been ignored in her will.  Instead the Metropolitan Museum of Art received the valuable paintings and works of art, charities were given hefty amounts of money and St. Michael’s Church received more than $1 million in real estate and $50,000 in cash.

The money, no doubt, made Tiffany’s decoration of the Chapel of the Angels less burdensome.

On November 10, 1921 the Rev. Dr. John Punnett Peters died of a heart attack.   Although he was noted as a civic reformer (not only had he battled the Amsterdam Avenue train tracks, he was Chairman of the Committee for the Extension of Transfers on Street Car lines and the President of the Transit Reform Committee of One Hundred and a crusader against “commercialized vice”) he was much more.

In addition to heading St. Michael’s Church, he had been a noted archaeologist, Hebrew scholar and expert on Babylonian excavations.  It was Dr. Peters who discovered and excavated the ancient city of Nippur and led the first archaeological expedition of the University of Pennsylvania to Babylonia. 

After nearly a century of use, St. Michael’s Church embarked on a three-year restoration in 1989.  Nicholson & Galloway, Inc. cleaned and repointed 20,000 square feet of the limestone façade.  The church bells and the timber supports of the belfry were removed and restored.  The entire Spanish tiled roof was removed and 18,000 square feet of original tile was replaced with matching Ludowici clay tiles.

But inside something daring was going on.   Fine Art Decorating of Manhattan restored the Tiffany interiors and then went a step further.   Because plans for the rest of the church were never completed by Tiffany, the firm carefully designed decorations in the Tiffany spirit.

Costing over half a million dollars, the result is dazzling.  The sanctuary that for nearly a century had moped in drab neutral colors now exploded in vivid primary colors with gold accents.  The entire space was now cohesive, perhaps as the renowned decorating firm had originally envisioned.

photo http://blog.glassquarterly.com/2012/04/23/event-upcoming-lecture-will-explore-tiffanys-work-beyond-windows/

St. Michael’s Church was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the New York State Register of Historic Places in 1997.

The Lost 1807 St. John's Chapel -- Varick near Hudson Streets

photo Library of Congress

In the first years of the 19^th century, Trinity Episcopal Church owned vast amounts of land north of the city, granted by the British Crown in 1705.  The Board of Trinity moved to begin development of this unused land, known as the Church Farm, and on September 13, 1802 resolved to erect a chapel of convenience.

When, in March 1803, the Board announced the intended site, an uproar ensued.  Erecting a substantial church structure along Hudson Street to the north, it was widely felt, was foolish.  The area was undeveloped and boggy, filled with reeds and overrun with mosquitoes and snakes.    It was a rural area “where was skating in winter and hunting in summer.”

Trinity was undeterred.  The chapel was intended to be the focal point of what would become an exclusive residential neighborhood, centered on a private park. 

Architect John McComb had recently completed the design for New York City’s distinguished City Hall, with Joseph-Francois Magnin, which was currently being constructed.  The church gave the commission for St. John’s Chapel to McComb.

Construction began later that year and as the church rose, the previously-worthless Hudson Square was converted to an elegant park.  By the time the chapel was completed in 1807, St. John’s Park had become accepted as a fashionable area and elegant Federal mansions were being constructed.

The Chapel, the park and the surrounding residences created the most exclusive enclave in New York -- print The New York Mirror 1829 (copyright expired)

John McComb’s completed St. John’s Chapel was magnificent.  A near-copy of London’s St. Martin-in-the-fields, it cost a staggering $172,833.   The organ, ordered in Philadelphia, cost another $6,000.  In 1908 the Architectural Record would call it “in the straitest sect of the British Georgian of its period.”  A prominent double-height portico, supported by carved Corinthian sandstone columns sheltered the entrance.  Above, a glorious 214-foot tower rose. 

The church was among the finest examples of Georgian architecture in the United States -- photo NYPL Collection

“The interior of St. John’s, with its towering side columns and high, wide, sweeping arches, is in keeping with the imposing exterior,” the New-York Tribune commented a century after construction.

photo NYPL Collection

St. John’s Park, anchored by the chapel, became the most fashionable residential neighborhood of the city.  Well-dressed ladies strolled its paths and elegant carriages discharged the most respected citizens at the doors of surrounding homes.

St. John's Chapel and the park in winter around 1865 -- print NYPL Collection

Trinity Church was not only in the business of saving souls, it was in the business of business.  Two years after the end of the Civil War the church shocked New York City by selling St. John’s Park to the Hudson River Railroad Company.    The company immediately began plans to replace the refined private green with a freight terminal.

A stereopticon slide captured the destruction of St. John's Park, to be replaced by a freight terminal, around 1868. 

St. John’s Chapel, however, continued on even as its wealthy parishioners began moving away from the noise and dirt of the new rail yards.  On December 25, 1869, the New-York Tribune reported on the chapel’s holiday decorations.  “There are more than thirty trees in the church, which in some degree, wears the air of a little garden.  A running vine festoons the arches on the west end, and the capitals of the pillars are festooned with laurels.”  The article added that “There will be an interesting children’s festival in the church on Tuesday evening, 28^th inst., when presents will be liberally distributed, and there will be a grand Christmas tree.”

The following year a similar event was held when approximately 2,000 children crowded into the chapel.  “Before the altar was a huge Christmas tree profusely decorated, and lighted by a calcium light,” reported the New-York Tribune on December 28, 1870.  “The gifts for the children, chiefly books and toys, were spread on tables in front of the altar.  The presents were valuable, liberal contributions, having been made by the vestry of Trinity parish, to which the chapel belongs, and by the congregants.”

One-by-one the grand brick homes were either razed or converted to warehouses and offices as their owners fled the neighborhood.    In 1890 The Real Estate Record and Guide noted that fashionable citizens thought “it vulgar to live among the packing boxes, and to inhale the odor of fresh fish and tarpaulins.”   John McComb’s refined Georgian edifice now sat among decidedly unfashionable structures.

In 1892 the vestry of Trinity announced its intentions to raze St. John’s chapel.  The remaining congregants, as well as indignant citizens who simply admired the chapel’s architectural beauty, rebelled.   An ongoing battle to save or destroy the church ensued that would last two decades.  At the forefront was St. John’s pastor, the Rev. Dr. Philip A. H. Brown who earned the sobriquet “The Fighting Vicar.”

On Sunday, May 2, 1896 Dr. Brown spoke of the church from its pulpit.  “It stands today, with its weather-beaten, but still magnificent porch, its thick strong walls, built to last for centuries, one of the finest specimens of this kind of architecture to be found in the country.  There are in this city many more costly church buildings, but I don’t know of any which so impresses me with the quiet dignity belonging to the House of God as does St. John’s.”

In 1908 Dr. Manning, Rector of Trinity Church, closed the chapel, saying it “was not good business or religion to continue services where the attendance was so small.”

With Dr. Brown’s death in 1909, the cause was taken up by other concerned citizens as Trinity moved closer to demolition.   In April of that year John Burke “and others” filed an injunction against the “Rector, Churchwardens, and Vestrymen of Trinity church, and others,” to prevent the destruction of St. John’s Chapel. 

Things worsened in 1912 when the Board of Estimate planned the widening of Varick Street – the portico of St. John’s Chapel sat squarely in the path of the road improvement. 

Yet, Borough President George McAneny took up the church’s cause with a brilliant scheme.  He proposed that the structure be preserved with the sidewalk simply running under the portico.  The plan was based on the identical treatment of St. Michael’s and St. Philip’s churches in Charleston, South Carolina.    The city was in agreement.   All that was necessary was the consent of the corporation of Trinity Church.

But the Church was still in the business of business.   The land on which the century-old structure sat—once virtually worthless—had become exceedingly valuable.     Writing in The American Architect in 1912, Ransom W. Haddon recognized the looming danger.

“It is a fact, unfortunate as true, that most of the people here in America take little interest in the few remaining good examples of early Colonial architecture that have escaped destruction…A good example is offered by St. John’s, one of the chapels of Trinity Church, in this city, now menaced by the proposed widening of Varick Street…Unless some action is speedily taken, this venerable building will soon be razed.”

John A. Handforth pleaded in a letter to the editor of the New York Tribune, noting the priceless architectural integrity of the building.  “Of the churches designed by Sir Christopher Wren now remaining in the City of London proper,” he wrote, “only two, St. Bride’s and St. Mary-Le-Bow, exceed it in beauty as to detail, and neither is so finely proportioned as is old St. John’s.”

The widening of Varick Street inches closer to St. John's Chapel (background) in 1918 --photo gbfans.com

Intent on realizing the property value under the church, Trinity announced it would donate the building to anyone buying the land.  The chess game went on as the widening of Varick Street inched closer and closer to St. John’s Chapel.

And then time ran out.

On October 6, 1918, The New York Times mourned, “In the demolition of St. John’s Chapel New York has lost not only a revered landmark but one of the choicest specimens of Georgian church architecture in the United States…Architects have agreed that St. John’s had few if any superiors of its kind either in England or this country, and it has been said that neither the justly admired St. Michael’s Church in Charleston, Christ Church in Philadelphia, nor King’s Chapel in Boston surpassed it in simplicity of proportion or exquisite refinement of architectural detail.”

Within two years Trinity Church Corporation got its wish when it sold the land to Adolph Pricken of Coastwise Warehouses for a $2 million warehouse.

The AIA Guide to New York City perhaps best summarized the loss.  Speaking of the concrete-covered, traffic jammed area still called St. John’s Park, it said “…try to superimpose this image: gents in top hats and elegant women in long skirts strolling in a gracefully quiet park lined with staid houses, the chapel bells tolling in the evening.  All gone.  Our ancestors preserved many a New York treasure, but blew it here.”

The Lost St. Clement's Church -- 108 West 3rd Street

On July 26, 1830 the parish of St. Clement's Protestant Episcopal Church was officially organized.  Only three days later the cornerstone of its church building was laid at 108 Amity Street, between MacDougal and Sullivan Streets, in Greenwich Village.  (Amity Street would be renamed West Third Street in 1858.)  

The property had been donated by Thomas L. Servoss, "a wealthy businessman," according to The Sun.  Decades later, the New-York Tribune would recall, "At that time, the section was a choice portion of the city.  It contained the homes of many of New York's wealthiest and most respected families, many of whom were members of St. Clement's."

The structure was completed at a cost of $32,000 (nearly $920,000 today) and consecrated on May 5, 1831.  A stark departure from the ubiquitous Greek temple design, St. Clement's was styled in the new Gothic Revival style.  Two six-sided, crenellated towers flanked a double-height portico with graceful ogival arches and delicate, pencil-thin columns.  Both the portico and the gable shared the crenellation of the towers.

The revolutionary architecture quickly met with condemnation.  The Sun later reported, "In a few months it was decided the church was unfit for use and it should be torn down."  The concern was "that an attempt was being made to introduce so called 'Romish practices and doctrines'" and "The church attained much notoriety as a result," said the article.  However, "In about two years this was forgotten and St. Clement's went on as before."

Among the early members of the congregation were Edgar Allan Poe and his wife, Virginia.  The newlyweds (they were married in October 1830) had arrived in New York in February 1831 and lived "in a little frame house," according to The Sun years later, across the street from the church.  The newspaper said, "St. Clement's was the first Episcopal church in the city to have a vested choir and it is said the child wife of Poe often sat at the open window of their humble rooms to listen to the strains of music which floated across narrow Amity street from St. Clement's."

Interestingly, there was just one burial vault below the church, that of the Pintard family.  John Pintard, a wealthy merchant, is best remembered for founding the New-York Historical Society.  Pintard had the remains of his family removed from the old French graveyard on Pine Street to this vault.  He died on June 21, 1844, the last of the Pintards to be interred here.

In 1851, the organ originally built for St. John's Chapel in 1814 was installed in St. Clement's Church.   The 1909 Historical Guide to the City of New York would recall, "It was captured by the British and ransomed for $2,000."  

Like other congregations, St. Clement's threw its support behind Union troops during the Civil War.  On November 20, 1861, The New York Times reported on gifts being sent to injured soldiers.  The article said, "From the Ladies' Aid Association of St. Clement's Church, repeated evidences of liberality in well-chosen gifts for patients, and recently a large and valuable case containing pillows, cushions, &c., &c."

The church's assistant rector, Rev. Treadwell Walden, was appointed to a six-man "Committee of Inquiry" by the United States Sanitary Commission on May 19, 1864.  The other members were three eminent physicians (Dr. Valentine Mott, Dr. Ellerile Wallace and Dr. Edward Delafield) a district court judge and  diplomat Gouverneur Morris Wilkins.  Their purpose was to investigate "the terrible reports of suffering" in Southern military prisons.

The men traveled to enemy territory, gathered information, and published their findings in October 1864.  Their reports of "tens of thousands of brave men suffering under anguish as great as mortal can endure," according to The New York Times, resulted in a humanitarian agreement between the Union and Confederacy.  On October 28 the newspaper explained the plan permitted the Union Government "to send necessary supplies of food, clothing and medicines to the starving, naked and sick brave men whom the fortunes of war have placed in the power of the rebels."  In return, the Confederacy were allowed to "purchase abroad" supplies needed for prisoners held by the Union.

In the decade following the end of the war, well-to-do families moved further north along Fifth Avenue.  On December 12, 1875, Rev. Theodore A. Eaton spoke on the history of the church in his sermon.  "It was founded 45 years ago, when the locality in which the church edifice stands was one of the fashionable quarters of New York," he said.  But, as The New York Times noted, "The  gradual moving of private residences up town had taken away most of the wealthy members, and to-day there were but seven families connected with the church which worshiped there when the Rector began his ministry, twenty-five years ago."

from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.

The passage of time did not improve the situation.  On November 24, 1900, in reporting on the congregation's 70th anniversary, the New-York Tribune noted, "When St. Clement's was built it was surrounded by the private houses of many rich families.  St. Clement's finds itself now in an undesirable cosmopolitan population, near to factories and business houses."

The Sun added, "Houses formerly occupied by wealthy families [are] now tenanted by the poor.  Those people looked to St. Clement's not only for religious consolidation but also for financial aid."

As the neighborhood declined, Bishop Henry C. Potter led the push "to put the property to larger use," according to The Sun on September 4, 1909.  But the rector of St. Clement's, Rev. Edward H. Van Winkle, fought back, recognizing the parish's importance to the poor.  With his death on August 30, 1909, the only impediment to the diocese's plans was removed.  The Sun reported, "The vestry of St. Clement's Episcopal church in Third street is puzzled to know what to do with the property, estimated to be worth $250,000...The building has long been in a dilapidated condition."

A vestryman told the reporter from The Sun, "The church is falling to pieces and it is not wise to repair it.  There are a few loyal people, poor it is true, but they cannot be abandoned.  The property is theirs more than it is that of anybody else."

It did not take the diocese long to make a decision.  In June 1910 the remains of the Pintard family were moved to St. Michael's Cemetery in Queens, and demolition of the architecturally ground-breaking edifice began soon afterwards.  On August 13, 1911, The Sun reported, "The old church was razed last year as it was in danger of falling down.  Its site is now vacant, but it is supposed it will eventually be improved with big flats similar to those adjoining it on either side."

image via dp-plus.us

Today the site is occupied by New York University Law School's D'Agostino Hall.

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The 1908 St. Mary's Episcopal Church -- 521 West 126th Street

The Commissioners’ Plan of Manhattan’s that resulted in streets and avenues was published in 1811.  Within the next two decades the country estates closest to the city would be criss-crossed with thoroughfares and, in most cases, their elegant villas demolished.  But farther north the rural summer estates of the city’s wealthiest citizens would survive significantly longer.

The Bloomingdale Road, later renamed Broadway, was the major artery for travelers.  Dotted along it, roadhouses provided travelers rest and refreshment; while lanes and unpaved roads branched off toward the summer estates.  Around the convergence of the Bloomingdale Road and Manhattan Street (approximately 125^th Street today), a tiny village was laid out in 1806 by city surveyor Adolphus Loss. 

Called Manhattanville, it soon had a school and “house of entertainment," a market and a wharf.  The rural village attracted tenant farmers and blue collar workers.  A stage and a boat provided transportation for the eight mile trip to New York and before long a ferry to New Jersey was established.

By 1823 there were about 15 homes in the village for its mostly poor residents.  Although small, the population, augmented by the wealthy summertime residents, was large enough to warrant a house of worship.  On Thanksgiving Day, December 18, 1823 Rev. William Richmond, the rector of St. Michael’s Church in the village of Bloomingdale held a worship service in the school house.  He took the opportunity to invite residents to organize a proper church.

Although nearly all of the churches established in Manhattan's the rural north at the time were chapels of convenience—branches of established churches downtown—Richmond proposed an independent church and parish.  Wealthy merchant Jacob Schieffelin donated a plot of land 60 by 100 feet on Lawrence Street for the new St. Mary’s Protestant Episcopal Church.  The cornerstone was laid on June 15, 1824 and the little wooden structure was dedicated on October 23, 1826.

Included in the original membership rolls were prestigious names like Schieffelin, Lorrillard, Jay, de Peyster, Stuyvesant, and Lawrence.  Another was Elizabeth Hamilton, the widow of Alexander Hamilton, and her two sons.  The Hamilton mansion, The Grange, sat nearby.  Other Manhattanville residents had a harder time gaining membership.  The Minutes of the Vestry dated December 27, 1823 limited membership to “white male persons of full age, who shall for one year last, preceding the election, have worshipped according to the rites of the Protestant Episcopal Church and shall have contributed the sum of not less than fifty cents.”

Five years after its doors were opened St. Mary’s Church eliminated pew rent.  What sounds like a forward-thinking and generous move was probably simply pragmatic.  Although there were wealthy members; the majority of parishioners were poor and the pew rents were meager.  Trustees finally decided to simply forgo the rents altogether.

As the city crept northward the villages in what would eventually be clumped together as Harlem thrived.  St. Mary’s Church focused on the betterment of the Manhattanville residents.  Trustees established the Free School of St. Mary’s Church which was “open equally to all denominations;” and in 1864 opened “The Sheltering Arms.”  The New York Times described The Sheltering Arms as “a charitable institution…to give a home to children, not orphans, but who from one reason or another have been deprived of the comforts of a home.” 

By the beginning of the 20^th century Manhattanville was fully developed.  The little wooden church on Lawrence Street was no longer adequate for the growing congregation.  Although rector, the Rev. Hiram R. Hulse, pushed for a new building in the late 1890s, the project was delayed by a lack of funds. 

Then on February 2, 1908 the New-York Tribune announced that the old building would be razed and a new church erected on the site.  The newspaper said it “will be of brick, with trimmings of limestone, of Gothic design, with a large decorative tracery window and a peaked roof, with an ornamental gablet.” 

One month later, on March 8, The New York Times remarked “To-day marks the passing of St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, in Lawrence Street, near 129^th Street, east of Broadway, which will, however live again in a handsome new brick and stone edifice to be erected on the old site.”

The Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide was a bit wistful to see the venerable structure go.  Below the headline “Another Landmark to Disappear,” it reported on March 21, 1908 “The awarding of the contract to the Amsterdam Building Co, 43 West 27^th st., to erect the new edifice in Lawrence st…means the disappearance of an old landmark in Harlem.  The present frame structure was built in 1823 and is one of the oldest in the city.”

The periodical credited the design to “Architects Carrere & Hastings” and predicted it would be “an attractive structure of stone and brick.”  The writer failed to name firm member Theodore E. Blake who was mainly responsible for the design.

The charming structure was completed before the end of the year.  Blake and his associates had produced a picturesque country church for what was now a bustling community.  The New-York Tribune reflected on the change in the neighborhood saying “The new St. Mary’s replaced a wooden structure constructed in 1828, when Manhattanville was a scattered village of country homes and villas on Bloomingdale Road, far to the north of the city of New York.  To-day the city has not only grown up to it, but miles beyond.”

Built of red brick with stone detailing, its English Gothic design bore some striking similarities to Renwick & Sands’ 1868 Church of the Holy Sepulcher on East 74^th Street.  Blake’s structure, however, was dominated by the enormous Gothic arched window with its graceful tracery.  Atop the gable sat a quaint open bell tower crowned by a Celtic cross.  The bell from the original St. Mary’s hung in the tower.  The side porch of the church was carefully erected over the burial vault of the Jacob Schieffelin family.

Inside the architects carried out the rural ambiance with exposed beams and fretwork and unplastered brick walls.  And yet the proportions of the space resulted in a melding of the charm with grandeur.  The $35,000 cost would translate to about $856,000 today.

Blake forwent frescoes and lavish decoration for quiet charm.  photograph taken around 1910 by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York, http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult_VPage&VBID=24UAYWPC5GPF&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=915

The consecration of the new St. Mary’s was held on New Year’s Day 1909.  A long list of clergymen assisted in the service which was celebrated by Bishop David H. Greer.  The New-York Tribune reported that the congregation “crowded the structure.”

St. Mary’s Protestant Episcopal Church drew its choir partly from The Sheltering Arms.  In 1912 the voices of twelve men and eight women were augmented by those of a dozen boys from that organization.  Choirmaster T. B. Arden was secure in his choir’s supply of young voices—it was the grown-ups that were making him nervous.  They were rampantly pairing off and getting married, threatening the continued existence of his group.

On September 16, 1912 The Sun reported that Arden “is afraid that if Cupid doesn’t leave his choir alone his church will be without music…He lost two men and two young women through marriages last week, and it is known that very soon three more engagements will be announced.”

The newspaper told readers that choir members Helen Belle and Frank Roe had been married in the church on the past Monday; and two days later soproano Mabel Quigley gave a party at her home to the choir members.  “Under the ice cream plates were found cards announcing that she had been married to William C. Blockwood.”  It was almost too much for the choirmaster to handle.

“The impending engagements, Mr. Arden thinks, will break up the choir if those concerned leave it when they marry.”

 

The 1908 side windows hint at the Art Nouveau movement.

Six years after Prohibition was enacted, a strong push for repeal swept the nation.  Many of those who believed that the outlawing of alcohol would reduce taxes and better the quality of life now recognized that there was a downside.  Organized crime was rampant; hundreds of millions of federal tax revenue was lost; while millions were being spent on Prohibition enforcement.

Charles Breck Ackley, pastor of St. Mary’s, however, was unmoved.  On November 1, 1926 he stood before his congregation and addressed the growing pressure for repeal.  He argued that six years was not long enough for Prohibition to prove itself.

“A great moral and ethical question is before the American people, and especially the people of this State.  My contention is not that prohibition has as yet been proved to be the final answer, but we are in the midst of a great experiment in human betterment.  We have not had time to really try it out, even if we had whole-hearted enforcement and cooperation by our citizens.  We should be good sportsmen enough to really try the experiment, to carry it through.”

 

The once-rural neighborhood was much changed by 1932.  Behind the garden sits the 1851 parish house, another reminder of gentler times.  photograph from the collection of the New York Public Library

Ackley was not the first and certainly not the last rector of St. Mary’s unafraid to voice his opinion.  One of the most outspoken would be the Rev. Robert W. Castle, Jr. who took the pulpit in 1987.  By now Lawrence Street had become West 126^th Street and the congregation was largely black and Hispanic.

Father Castle’s ministry was as much about social outreach as spiritual preaching.  He had marched alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and picketed businesses that refused to hire minorities.  Among his first actions as rector was to bring in a Spanish-speaking priest so neighbors could hear mass in their language.  When the nearby Cathedral of St. John the Divine held a service honoring General Colin L. Powell and other Operation Desert Storm participants, Castle was out front with the protesters.

The fiery and determined actions of the priest resulted in the 1992 documentary film “Cousin Bobby,” in which Castle played himself.  His convincing performance led to other roles, including the father of Tom Hanks’ character, Andrew Beckett, dying from AIDS in the 1993 film “Philadelphia.”

 

A 2014 occasion prompted streamers in the timbered sanctuary.

Father Robert Castle retired in 2000 but his legacy continues on West 126^th Street.  Under his direction the St. Mary’s Episcopal Center was established across the street from the church; a residence and day treatment center for people living with HIV/AIDS.  The church continues to reach out to the homeless and needy and runs a “supermarket style” Food Pantry and a mobile soup kitchen.

Theodore Blake’s 1908 brick and stone jewel is virtually unchanged and meticulously maintained.

non-credited photographs taken by the author

St. James' Episcopal Church -- 865 Madison Avenue

photo by Alice Lum

Following the Revolutionary War, the summer estates of Manhattan’s wealthy citizens on the northern reaches of the island were reopened as a sort of normality returned.   Small churches were erected to serve the seasonal communities, among them St. James’ Church on Hamilton Square at 69^th Street and Lexington Avenue.

What would become Lexington Avenue is unpaved and muddy -- print from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Paid for by Trinity Church and built in 1809 through 1810, the clapboard chapel served the residents with properties along the East River.   Its rector rushed between services here and at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, a similar wood-frame country church on the opposite side of the island, using the Harsenville Road (what is essentially now 71^st Street).

Within a decade several of the wealthy parishioners made the area their full-time residence.  The little church was opened year-round in the 1820s.  While the neighborhood remained rural for some time (in 1837 the city was renting much of the land as pasture); the city was moving closer.

During the Civil War Hamilton Square was used as a parade ground and in 1867 the city reduced its size to accommodate development.  Two years later, it eliminated the park altogether.   Despite the war raging to the south, development continued.  Engineers leveled Lenox Hill, laying out the cross streets and extending Lexington Avenue northward—necessitating the demolition of St. James’.

Now a heated discussion arose concerning a new building.  The neighborhood, known as Yorkville, had been filling with immigrants fleeing the overcrowded and unsanitary Lower East Side.  The rector pushed for rebuilding near the old site in order to serve this needy community.  The church trustees, however, preferred to retain the congregation’s upper-class tradition and move closer to the new mansions rising along Madison and Fifth Avenues.

Land was procured on East 72^nd Street and in 1869 the new church was dedicated.  The wealth of the congregation is evident in their choice of architects.  James Renwick, Jr. was responsible for the masterful Gothic Revival Grace Church, completed in 1846, and his monumental St. Patrick’s Cathedral was rising on Fifth Avenue when he was approached to design the new St. James’.    Renwick’s design would be less historically pure than the former two churches; its updated Victorian Gothic façade more charming than majestic.

But the Renwick church would not suffice for long.  Development of the Upper East Side boomed during the last quarter of the century and in 1884 construction began on a larger structure at the corner of Madison Avenue and 71^st Street.  Once again the parish had turned to one of the leading architects of the time—R. H. Robertson.

Horse-drawn street cars go north and south near the Robertson-designed St. James' with its never-completed, stubby corner tower -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Robertson embraced the newly-popular Romanesque Revival style, developing his own take with rough-cut stone and contrasting materials.   For the new St. James’ Episcopal Church he played all his cards.  Brownstone, granite, terra cotta and tiled shingles melded together to form connected, arched windows, towers and arcades.  Robertson turned the building around, putting the entrance down the block rather than on Madison Avenue as would be expected.  Now there was no chance that the glorious windows of the chancel would be blacked out by tall construction next door.

The new building was completed in 1885 and services began with a rather stumpy corner tower still uncompleted.  It never would be.

Robertson's church and parsonage were a delicious feast of materials, textures and shapes -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Unlike the Gothic Revival style favored by Renwick that became nearly synonymous with ecclesiastical architecture, the Romanesque Revival style faded.  By the 1920s Robertson’s robust design was not yet historical, it was merely old-fashioned.  Perhaps no architect of the day was more well-known for his Gothic designs than Ralph Adams Cram.

In 1924 Cram was the Supervising Architect of Princeton University where his Collegiate Gothic buildings had been going up since 1907.  He had received the commission for the gigantic Cathedral of St. John the Divine in 1911 and was responsible, with Bertram Goodhue, for Saint Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue.  He was now approached by St. James’ to remodel the outdated church.

Cram removed Robertson’s towers and round arches and completely reoriented the sanctuary.   The three entrances openings were positioned on Madison Avenue, affording a grander entry.  Above the central entrance door a large, lacy rose window burst forth.  Robertson’s squat corner tower remained; but now with a more complete-looking Gothic belfry added by Cram in 1926. 

The earlier church was unrecognizable after Cram's redesign.  In 1926 the newly-added belfry is evident in the contrasting color and texture of the stone -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Inside the architect embellished the space with exposed polished beams supporting the ceiling, a gilded reredos and soaring stone arches.

Cram designed the breathtaking gilded reredos -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Structural problems with the Gothic tower appeared in the 1940s, necessitating its removal.  Architect Richard Kimball was commissioned to design a replacement which was completed in 1950.  By current tastes, the mid-century addition is, at best, incongruous.  The modernistic steeple has been dubbed “the tin can.”

photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Considering St. James’ somewhat haughty history, its outreach to the homeless in the 1980s might have seemed ironic.   In 1981 the Rev. William E. Smyth became alarmed at the increasing number of homeless bedding down on church doorsteps, including his.   He helped form the Neighborhood Coalition for Shelter with the support of other churches, synagogues and other institutions.  The coalition worked to find shelter for those truly in need.

Somewhat affectionately called the "tin can," Kimball's steeple marches to its own music -- photo by Alice Lum

The church opened a soup kitchen around the same time, offering meals to the homeless.  Well-dressed residents of the neighborhood would often see a line of up to 60 indigent men waiting patiently for a hot lunch.

A restoration of St. James’ was initiated in 1999 by architect Lee Harris Pomeroy.  Now half a century old, the anomalous Kimball steeple had become a familiar if quirky part of the architecture.  Rev. Brenda G. Husson reportedly explained “We all know it doesn’t fit architecturally, but it’s our steeple.”

photo by Alice Lum

Renwick's 1859 Chancery Bldg. -- No. 266 Mulberry Street

The building sits within the Calvary Cemetery grounds.  To the right through the trees Old St. Patrick's Cathedral can be glimpsed -- photo by Alice Lum

St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Mulberry Street was already nearly three decades old in 1843 when the first marble blocks were laid for James Renwick, Jr.’s masterful Grace Church.  The 23-year old engineer had no formal training as an architect; but the resulting structure, completed three years later, was spectacular.  The lacy carved stone tracery, soaring steeple and majestic interior of the Episcopalian church vied challenged the Roman Catholic St. Patrick’s.  King’s Handbook of New York City would say of it “Few if any of the churches surpass Grace in beauty of interior design and decoration.  It is impressive and magnificent.”

Exactly ten years after construction of Grace Church commenced, the powerful and aggressive Archbishop John Joseph Hughes considered a new and magnificent cathedral.  He chose the block of land on the still-unpaved Fifth Avenue between 50^th and 51^st street, directly south of the newly-completed Catholic Orphan Asylum.  Some might have thought the location was a strange choice.  Nearly ten blocks north of the Croton Reservoir (where the paved section of the Avenue stopped), the area was almost completely undeveloped.

Hughes chose Renwick to design his monumental cathedral.  Renwick was assisted by William Rodrique who, by coincidence or not, was the Archbishop’s brother-in-law.  By now Renwick was responsible for several notable Gothic Revival structures—including the Smithsonian Institution, the Free Academy on Lexington Avenue, and brooding civic buildings like the Small-Pox Hospital on Blackwell’s Island.  As he did with Grace Church, Renwick would turn white marble into lace as St. Patrick’s Cathedral began rising.

In 1858, the year that the cornerstone for the new St. Patrick’s Cathedral was laid, Hughes saw the need for a Chancery Office for the growing administrative staff.  As the Catholic Church had rapidly expanded in New York, proper office facilities were necessary.  The Chancellor of the diocese was responsible for granting matrimonial dispensations, supervising the financial condition of the parishes, and overseeing spending, charities, and such fiduciary activities.

The Archibishop turned again to Renwick and Rodrique.  A plot of land on the old St. Patrick’s ground was relegated for the new building, where it would become part of the cathedral complex including a convent and school.  While the block-encompassing cathedral uptown would take decades to build, the Chancery Office was completed within the year.

Renwick once again drew on the Gothic Revival style.  But the administrative building would not be of intricately carved white marble.  While it harmonized with the nearby church and showed elements of religious architecture; it would be nearly fanciful.  Renwick ornamented the red brick structure with miniature buttresses, quatrefoil carvings, and accented the openings and capped the buttresses with white stone.  A projecting cornice, supported by deep brick corbelled arches, was crenellated like a castle wall.  Calvary Cemetery surrounded the Chancery Office and the cathedral behind the tall brick wall that enclosed the property.

With no chance of other buildings crowding in, the location allowed for windows on all sides.  The tall brick wall see at right originally ran the length of the property. -- photo by Alice Lum

Along with the Chancellor the building housed the offices of the treasurer and the secretary of the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylums, the offices of Calvary Cemetery, and other administrative offices.  On the night of January 24, 1869 the expectation of cash in the cemetery offices proved tempting to thieves.

The crooks scaled the brick wall and landed unseen in the churchyard.  They determinedly broke through the side wall of the Chancery Building and gained entrance.  Inside, they found the cemetery office safe.  “The desired valuables being locked up in the safe, the marauders attacked that receptacle with a heavy sledge and finally demolished it by dint of hard blows,” reported The New York Times the following morning.  The burglars made off with $5,000 in bonds “and a small amount in greenbacks.”  The haul would amount to about $82,500 today.

When cemetery officials opened the office the next day the crime was discovered and police were notified.  Civil War period forensics were primitive at best and the crooks were never found.  “Inspector Walling and Detectives Elder and Irving visited the scene of the exploit,” said The Times, “but failed to find any clue to the thieves, except the heavy sledge and a piece of fine paper, which had evidently been wrapped around a ‘jimmy’ or small crowbar.”

photo by Alice Lum

The building was also the scene of Church trials.  One of the most publicized was that of the liberal-minded Father Thomas Farrell of St. Joseph’s Church on Sixth Avenue.  During the Civil War he pushed for political rights for freed blacks and aggressively supported emancipation.  It was Father Farrel’s involvement with “the Accademia” that caused him problems with Cardinal McCloskey, however.   (Cardinal Hughes had died in 1864, never to see his new cathedral completed.)

The Accademia was a group of priests who regularly met at St. Joseph’s and openly discussed radical modifications in the Church such as discarding the tradition of priestly celibacy and the Latin liturgy, questioned the infallibility of the Pope and, among other things, wondering aloud how nuns were capable of instructing future wives and mothers.  Despite letters and meetings between the two, Farrell continued his activities and outspoken views.

After the Cardinal removed him as pastor of St. Joseph’s, Farrell demanded a canonical trial.  “Let it not be said of our Church in the nineteenth century that she allowed a priest to be hung without a trial,” he wrote.  On February 3, 1871 his trial played out in the Chancery Office.  The six priests who were charged with judging Father Farrell unanimously agreed that his activities justified his removal.

The indomitable priest expected as much and informed the Cardinal that neither he nor the priests had found “a single falsehood” he had spoken.  McCloskey, on the other hand, called Farrell’s teachings “filthy, vile and stupid balderdash of false doctrine.”  Although the priest resolved to appeal to Rome; the Cardinal won out in the end.

Among the issues that led to Father Farrell's troubles was his vocal opinion that Catholic children should be allowed to attend public schools.  The Church’s strong stance regarding public schools would be seen again in 1889 when Theresa Kelly died.  Although she owned a plot in Calvary Cemetery, she was, according to The New York Times, “one of the most active members of Dr. McGlynn’s Anti-Poverty Society.”  Like Father Farrell, Father Edward McGlynn was highly controversial for his progressive ideas; one of which was the belief that Catholic children should attend public schools.

In reporting the 48-year old Sunday School teacher’s death from a stroke, The New York Times noted “When the Anti-Poverty Society was formed she joined it, and was a regular attendant at the meetings of the Anti-Poverty Society, but at the same time was not negligent of her Sunday school duties, and remained a devout Catholic and a regular communicant.”   The newspaper added “The question that is interesting the members of the Anti-Poverty Society is whether the deceased can be buried as a good Catholic.”

While officials considered the issue, Theresa Kelly’s body was held in the receiving vault of Calvary Cemetery.  Two weeks passed and her parish priest, Dr. Burtsell, issued a written certificate saying, according to The Evening World on November 14, 1889, “that Miss Kelly was a good Catholic, notwithstanding she was a member of the Anti-Poverty Society, and entitled to Christian burial.”  Nevertheless the officials in the Chancery Office building refused to issue a burial permit.

Friends and family held little hope, despite Theresa Kelly’s owning the burial plot in Calvary.  A year earlier another Anti-Poverty Society member, John McGuire was refused burial there.  Affadavits and pleas did not move the cemetery officials and on November 14 the undertaker gave up, telling reporters “I shall bury her this afternoon or to-morrow in Woodlawn.”

The Parochial School Board had its offices in the building by 1892 when Archbishop Michael Corrigan told every priest in the archdiocese that he expected “the celebration of the four hundredth anniversary of the discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus with religious pomp and ceremony,” as reported by The New York Times on August 24.  The School Board reacted swiftly, and met to discuss a parade of school children on October 12 and 13.  The Archbishop’s expectations were not taken lightly.  A committee was appointed “for the purpose of securing floats for the use of the girls who will take part in the parades.”

Church offices were still in the building in 1929 when this photograph was taken -- from the collection of  the New York Public Library

The building would also be used as the Parish Hall and for a period was the annex to the nearby St. Patrick’s School.  But by 1936 the old structure was no longer viable as either an administrative or school building.  It was converted to a chapel for Russian Catholic services.

On December 19, 1936 The New York Times reported “Special Christmas services according to the Russian divine liturgy will be held at a new Russian Catholic church that has been established in Mulberry Street near East Houston Street and next to Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral.  The building the new congregation is using was the old chancery office.”

/Edward V. Gillon captured a rather foreboding image around 1975 -- from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult_VPage&VBID=24UAYWNQMKC5&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=915#/SearchResult_VPage&VBID=24UAYWNQMKC5&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=915&PN=1

The building became St. Michael’s Chapel.  Nearly eight decades later the Russian Byzantine Rite congregation remains here.  The Russian population of New York swelled following World War II; and another wave of immigrants began in 1974.  Nevertheless, according to the St. Michael’s Chapel Association, “St. Michael’s has always attracted not only Russians seeking to maintain their spiritual roots while finding their way in American society, but also many non-Russians who were attracted to the richness and beauty of Russian spirituality.”

James Renwick’s charming Chancery Building is easily overlooked in the tangled web of downtown streets.  Along with Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral, however, it is well worth a special expedition.