Reprinted with permission as a public service by the Landmark Society of the Niagara Frontier, now the Preservation Buffalo Niagara


Houses of Worship: A Guide to the Religious Architecture of Buffalo, New York
By James Napora
Table of Contents

FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH - 1899
North at North Pearl Streets (SE)
Architect: Robert A. Wallace
Founded 3 April, 1822

Although organized in 1822, the birth of the First Baptist Church of Buffalo coincides with the 1818 arrival in Buffalo of John A. Lazzell, a Baptist missionary. It was through his work that the Baptist movement in Buffalo took hold.

In 1821 he secured land on the east side of Pearl Street, between Mohawk and Huron Streets, from the Holland Land Company for use by an anticipatedBaptist Society. The following year, he secured a preacher, Rev. Elon Galusha of Whitesboro, New York, to travel to this area and organize a congregation. On 3 April, 1822, with 14 members, Rev. Galusha established the First Baptist Society of the Village of Buffalo. Four days later, they held their first service in St. Paul's Episcopal Church. For the next seven years, they conducted services in the schoolhouse, the courthouse on Lafayette Square, and a meeting room at Main and Genesee Streets.

By 1829, sufficient funds were available with which to construct a place of worship. At that time, they sold the site they had acquired eight years previous, as the congregation felt that it was too far north of the then center of the city. With the proceeds of the sale they purchased land on the northeast corner of Washington and Seneca Streets and constructed a small frame building. They had outgrown their chapel by 1836 and sold it to the United States Government for the site of the Customs House.

The congregation, now known as the Washington Street Baptist Church, constructed a new building (dedicated 5 June, 1836) on the east side of Washington Street north of Swan at a cost of $24,000. It was from this building that seven early Baptist congregations grew:

The population of the city continued to grownorthward, and by 1894, the area of their place of worship had increasingly given way to encroaching businesses. The congregation, once gain known as The First Baptist church, abandoned its old building and began meeting in the Teck Theater on the southwest corner of Main and Edward Streets.

At that time the Trustees of the church organized a competition for the design of a new place of worship. Considering the towers to be an unnecessary extravagance, they instructed the competing architects to design a building without one, and toapply the savings toward a more elaborate interior. The winning entry, a Neoclassical structure more befitting secular, ratherthan sacred purposes, was selected. The cornerstone is one of the few visual clues to the purpose of the building.

The second floor auditorium mirrors the elegance of exterior, with a three part arrangement of the altar space. The center recess is occupied by the pulpit, with the organ to the left and the baptismal pool to the right. The main floor seats 500 with further space for 200 in the balcony. In addition to the artglass of the exterior windows, the interior is lit by a nine part square skylight.


© 1995 James Napora
Page by Chuck LaChiusa with the assistance of David Torke
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