St. John's Lutheran Church

81 Christopher Street | West Village | built 1822

Open on the map6 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. 1822

    The Eighth Presbyterian Church builds a Federal-style church on Christopher Street

    Work began in 1821 on the church, which the Eighth Presbyterian Church, organized in 1819, finished the next year. Its architect's name is lost. The octagonal belfry over the pediment closely resembled the one on Newgate State Prison, a few blocks toward the Hudson. The congregation worshiped here until selling in April 1842 to St. Matthew's Episcopal Church.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  2. 1858

    St. John's Evangelical Lutheran Church buys the building for $13,000

    Rev. A. H. M. Held founded the Lutheran congregation in 1845, holding its first services in Hope Chapel on Broadway before moving to a New York University chapel. In 1858 its trustees bought the Christopher Street church from a Wesleyan Methodist group, then called St. Matthew's. The new owners added a $1,250 pipe organ built in Germany.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  3. 1886

    July 10

    Berg & Clark remodel the church and parish house in 1886

    Architects Berg & Clark filed plans on July 10, 1886 to lower the church floor, add stained-glass windows and redo the interior, at a cost of $10,000. They also embellished the pediment's half-round window with scrolls and a German-language plaque, and added balustrades with urns. Next door they gave the parish house a new Romanesque Revival brick front.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  4. 1935

    March 17

    An elder dies while leading the Sunday evening service

    George Tietjen, a 59-year-old elder who lived in Rutherford, New Jersey, was asked to stand in when pastor Fridolin Oberlander felt unwell as the evening service began. Tietjen read the Scriptures and announced a hymn, then sat down and collapsed before it began. The New York Times reported that he died while conducting the service.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  5. 1937

    March 14

    Pastor Oberlander preaches in German against the prejudice spreading abroad

    With Nazi Germany in the news, the Rev. Dr. Fridolin Emil Oberlander, speaking in German on March 14, 1937, urged his congregation to avoid the prejudice spreading abroad. He reminded them that Jesus descended from the Jewish people. Oberlander, who had led St. John's since 1914, died that December after nearly two months of illness.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  6. 1991

    The interactive show Tony n' Tina's Wedding stages its ceremony in the church

    In 1991 the off-Broadway show Tony n' Tina's Wedding opened in the church, with audiences playing guests at a mock Italian-American wedding ceremony here and a reception at 147 Waverly Place. Night after night the bride and groom dashed through thrown rice to a waiting limousine, stopping passersby in their tracks. The church still stages musical and dramatic productions.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

Further reading

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