Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church
7 West 55th Street | also 708 5th Avenue | Midtown | built 1900
Open on the map11 entries
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.
- 1808
The congregation now at Fifth Avenue organizes as the Presbyterian Church in Cedar Street
The congregation that now worships at Fifth Avenue and 55th Street began on November 6, 1808, on Cedar Street in lower Manhattan. Among its 26 original members were Oliver Wolcott Jr., who had served as Secretary of the Treasury, and Joanna Bethune, later known as the mother of the American Sunday School. The 28-year-old John B. Romeyn was called as the first pastor, and the church moved three times before settling uptown in 1875.
Source: fapc.org
- 1875
Carl Pfeiffer's Gothic Revival church opens at Fifth Avenue and 55th Street
Architect Carl Pfeiffer designed the congregation's fourth home, a Gothic Revival church on land bought for $350,000. The building cost about $1 million, and pews priced from $300 to $6,000 retired the debt within two years. Inside, Pfeiffer replaced the usual cruciform plan with an open, ship-like hall under a ribbed 60-foot ceiling, seating about 2,000 worshippers without stone pillars.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1910
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. marries at Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church
The church's sanctuary hosted the 1910 wedding of Theodore Roosevelt Jr., son of the former president. His father attended, along with about 500 of his former Rough Riders. The church had earlier held the joint funeral of Roosevelt's first wife, Alice, and his mother, Martha, in 1884.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1925
The church adds its chapel and church house, designed by James Gamble Rogers
In 1925 the church added a chapel and a church house to its grounds. The New York architect James Gamble Rogers designed both, and a Harkness family philanthropist paid for the project. The chapel is now named for Bryant Kirkland, a former senior pastor, and has a long, narrow plan with a semicircular apse and stained glass showing biblical stories.
“The current chapel and church house were added to the church grounds in 1925. Both were designed by the New York architect James Gamble Rogers…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1956
John Bonnell introduces Dial-a-Prayer at Fifth Avenue Presbyterian
John Bonnell, senior pastor from 1935 to 1962, introduced Dial-a-Prayer in 1956, a ministry the church kept up for about half a century. He also hosted the ABC radio series National Vespers, which reached 3 million listeners a week from 1936 until 1961. In 1966 Pope Paul VI presented him with a silver medal for ecumenical services.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1961
A new Austin organ reuses pipes from the church's older Jardine and Skinner organs
The sanctuary's present organ was built by the Austin Organ Company of Hartford, Connecticut, in 1961. It reuses pipework from two earlier instruments, an 1875 Jardine organ and a 1913 E. M. Skinner organ. The church's art and architecture page says the instrument has four keyboards, 119 ranks and more than 7,000 individual pipes.
Source: fapc.org
- 1965
Duke Ellington and his orchestra record A Concert of Sacred Music at the church
Duke Ellington and his orchestra recorded A Concert of Sacred Music at Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in 1965. CBS television broadcast the concert nationally in 1966.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1998
The church starts a befriending ministry for people sleeping on its steps
In 1998 the church began a befriending ministry for people sleeping on its steps and sidewalks. That September, according to the church's own history, city officials asked churches to end overnight stays for homeless people, and the churches refused. The outreach later became the subject of a federal lawsuit.
Source: fapc.org
- 2001
The church sues New York City after police clear homeless people from its steps
In early December 2001 police began ordering homeless people off the church's steps, after the NYPD had tolerated the practice for more than two years, according to the NYCLU. Late that month the church sued the city, and a temporary restraining order was granted at once. On January 4, 2002, a preliminary injunction barred police from interfering with people sleeping on the steps, though not on the adjoining sidewalk.
Source: nyclu.org
- 2004
A federal court rules the city cannot stop people sleeping on the church's steps
On October 28, 2004, the federal district court gave the church summary judgment on its First Amendment claim, ruling that the city could not stop people from sleeping on its steps. The city appealed, and the Second Circuit affirmed the ruling in June 2006, according to the NYCLU's case page, which lists the case as closed.
Source: nyclu.org
- 2009
The church hosts dance legend Frankie Manning's memorial service
In 2009 the church held the memorial service for the dance legend Frankie Manning. The church's history page quotes The New York Times as calling it a rollicking three-hour service. The page lists it alongside the 1910 Roosevelt wedding and the 1965 Ellington recording among the events the sanctuary has hosted.
Source: fapc.org
Further reading
- Fifth Avenue Presbyterian ChurchWikipedia
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