St. Luke's Episcopal Church
435 West 141st Street | also 281 Convent Avenue | Hamilton Heights | built 1895
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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.
- 1821
St. Luke's parish, founded in 1821, sells its downtown property and moves north
The parish traces its start to 1821 and descends from St. Luke-in-the-Fields in Greenwich Village. After a protest, Trinity Church offers to buy the downtown property for $150,000, and St. Luke's accepts. It moves far uptown to the northeast corner of 141st Street and Convent Avenue.
Source: Forgotten New York
- 1889
Hamilton's Grange is moved next to St. Luke's and used for services
When 143rd Street was cut through in 1889, Alexander Hamilton's country house was moved to 141st Street and Convent Avenue. A developer gave it to St. Luke's Episcopal Church, whose congregation worshipped in it while building its new church next door. The house stayed wedged beside the church until the National Park Service moved it to St. Nicholas Park in 2008.
Source: National Park Service
- 1892
St. Luke's opens its Romanesque church on Convent Avenue
The congregation, which had moved up from Greenwich Village in the 1880s, opened its new church in 1892. Robert H. Robertson designed it in dark red brownstone in the Romanesque style, and a statue of Alexander Hamilton stands in the front yard. In the 1940s St. Luke's merged with St. Martin's on Lenox Avenue.
Source: thecuriousuptowner.com
- 1892
Money troubles leave R. H. Robertson's St. Luke's without its tower
Architect Robert H. Robertson, who made his name in the 1880s with Romanesque designs, plans an ambitious new church for St. Luke's, and it opens in 1892. Continuing financial difficulties force the parish to scale back. Much of the planned carving and a tall square tower on the corner are left unbuilt.
Source: Forgotten New York
- 2021
The church that saved Hamilton's house is put up for sale
In December 2021 the St. Luke's building was listed for $12 million and marketed as a redevelopment opportunity. Services had already moved to St. Martin's, and the church stood covered in netting behind plywood fencing.
Source: thecuriousuptowner.com
Nearby
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