Rugged Cross Baptist Church

1084 Lafayette Avenue | also 1078 Lafayette Avenue | Bedford-Stuyvesant | built 1898

Open on the map4 entries

The lot about 1940
About 1940. Via 1940s.nyc
The lot about 1985
About 1985. Via 80s.nyc

The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

  1. 1898

    Former mayor Charles Schieren turns the first earth for an English-language Lutheran church

    Many German-American Lutherans in the Eastern District had grown more comfortable in English, and this congregation was built to serve them. Charles Schieren, a former mayor of Brooklyn and a descendant of German immigrants, made his fortune in leather and helped establish more than 40 such churches in the city. In 1898 he was present to turn the first earth at the site.

    Source: brownstoner.com

  2. 1899

    Dodge & Morrison design a Romanesque Revival church with windows from Munich

    The firm of Dodge & Morrison, best known for its churches, designed Christ Evangelical English Lutheran Church in the Romanesque Revival style, built in 1898-99. The congregation wished to keep some of its German heritage, so it commissioned stained glass from the Franz Mayer Studios of Munich. A large panel of Martin Luther fills the middle of the main window, over the choir loft.

    Source: brownstoner.com

  3. 1980

    Rugged Cross Baptist Church buys the former Lutheran church

    The Rugged Cross Baptist Church bought the building in 1980. It needed serious repair, with immediate work on the steeple and extensive work on some of the stained glass. As of 2011, the restoration was continuing slowly.

    Source: brownstoner.com

  4. 2007

    The church at 1084 Lafayette Avenue is listed on the National Register of Historic Places

    The church, also known as Rugged Cross Baptist Church, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2007. Built in 1898-1899, it is a Romanesque Revival building whose cream-colored brick walls are trimmed with beige brick and terra cotta. The front facade has a two-story central gable flanked by asymmetrical towers.

    “It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2007.”

    Source: Wikipedia

Further reading

Nearby

All 23 buildings with stories in Bedford-Stuyvesant