USA > New York > New York City > Annals of St. Michael's ; being the history of St. Michael's Protestant Episcopal Church, New York, for one hundred years 1807-1907 ; > Part 14
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INTERIOR OF THIRD CHURCH Looking toward Chancel
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Decorating the Church
pulpit was a plain wooden platform; the lectern, the wooden eagle lectern from the old church, a book-rest from the Sunday School room serving as lectern for the chapel. The only new article of furniture, outside of the simple pews and stalls, was the rector's handsome chair, given as a gift of love to Dr. T. M. Peters by the children of the institutions. At the time of his jubilee, in 1892, a new font had also been given to the church by various members of the congregation.
Dr. Peters had never expected to decorate the church, but left that as an obligation to his successor. The work began, as such things will, almost accidentally. People complained of the lack of a communion rail. They could not kneel without some support in front of them, and at a vestry meeting held October 10, 1893, a com- mittee was appointed with power to contract for an altar rail. The committee at once found that it could not contract for an altar rail without considering the relation of that altar rail to the entire furnishing and decoration of the chancel, and so it began to make inquiries with a view to laying before the Vestry a plan for that which it supposed would actually be under- taken at some future time. Artists and church decora- tion firms, seeing the great possibilities of the noble chancel of St. Michael's, made advances and proposi- tions as to the method of handling the same. It was a period of business depression, when there was little demand for work of this kind and prices were corres- pondingly low and terms favorable. Accordingly, after careful consideration, it seemed to the Vestry desirable to take in hand at that time the furnishing and decoration of the chancel. The Peters family offered to erect an altar in memory of the late Thomas McClure Peters, and on May 14, 1894, that offer was
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accepted. The Vestry decided to put in chancel win- dows at the same time, using for that purpose two legacies from members of old St. Michael's Church, $4000 from Charles S. Weyman and $2500 from Miss Elizabeth Low, to which was added a little later a gift of $1000 from a former vestryman, H. C. von Post. Out of a number of competitive designs, the Vestry selected that of Mr. Louis Tiffany. The original agreement provided only for the five chancel windows. To these the Vestry added later the two mosaic niches on either side of the five windows and the decoration of the chancel to the spring of the dome. The children of a former rector, Rev. James Cook Richmond, also gave a credence in memory of their father, and an altar cross, vases, and candlesticks were presented in remembrance of one who had done faithful service as choir-mother and member of the Altar Guild, Mary Louise Lawrance, wife of Harry B. Livingston. The altar and credence were completed (the altar of the old church was removed to the Chapel of the Angels, to be joined there shortly by the eagle lectern, where both have remained in use in loving memory of the second church) and dedicated on Easter, 1895, the windows and the mosaic niches on Christmas of the same year.
Since that date, two memorial windows have been placed in the Chapel of the Angels, one in memory of Constance Caroline Roome and the other, given by the ladies of the church and friends, in memory of Alice Clarissa Richmond Peters, and two in the eastern transept, one a gift from St. Agnes Guild and one a memorial, given by his daughter, of Dr. A. V. Williams, "for thirty years vestryman and warden of St. Michael's Church, a physician filled with the
INTERIOR OF THIRD CHURCH r. Chapel of the Angels 2. View of Nave from Chancel
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Planning a Parish House
spirit of the Lord and love for his fellow-men." A lectern was also given by Mr. and Mrs. S. J. Luckings in memory of a former worshipper and devoted worker, Alvira Chitry.
In this present centenary year the decoration of the chancel has been completed; a pulpit erected, as a gift from those who heard the Gospel preached in the first century of the church's history, that the same good tidings of great love may be preached through the century that is to come; and a baptismal window, placed in the south wall, adjoining the chancel, by the children baptized in the first century of the church's history; pulpit and window together symbo- lizing Christ's final command to His apostles to "go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."
Dr. Peters also bequeathed to his successor the task of building the Parish House. The first step towards the fulfilment of that bequest was the acquisition, in 1893, of a lot on Amsterdam Avenue immediately to the north of the church, it having been Dr. Peters's plan that the Parish House should occupy the space intervening between the northern end of the church and rooth Street on that avenue. On November 14, 1893, the Vestry took formal action looking to the erection of a parish house by appointing a Committee on Ways and Means. On December 23rd, that Com- mittee presented to the Vestry a rough estimate of $60,000 as the cost of the sort of building needed, ex- clusive of land. In the meantime, negotiations had been conducted for the purchase of the corner lot on Amsterdam Avenue and rooth Street, but the owner, supposing it to be necessary to the church, held it at a price which the Vestry felt to be excessive.
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When the late Dr. Peters bought the land opposite St. Michael's Church on Bloomingdale Road, he did so for the purpose of protecting the church, making at the time a proposition to exchange that land for some of the church land on Clendining Lane, which proposition was refused, the two parties not being able to agree as to the relative values of those properties. On the land thus acquired by him Dr. Peters had accumulated some three wooden buildings, which were finally rented to the church in whole or in part for temporary parish houses. It had been his intention, so soon as the time was ripe, to make a contribution towards the erection of a parish house, and his family now offered this land to the church for parish house purposes at a price which would include, at least in part, the gift he had proposed to make. The offer was accepted and the land purchased, but it was almost two years before steps were actually taken to raise funds to erect the much needed building. The completion of the decora- tion of the chancel, the building of a crypt beneath the Chapel of the Angels, the completion of various outside work about the church, including an iron fence, had all cost money, which had to be drawn from the church funds. The hard times had made themselves felt in the contributions of the congregation. On April 8, 1895, the Vestry considers the necessity of increasing the col- lections, and orders that a circular letter be prepared and distributed to the members of the congregation calling attention to the small amount contributed by them for current expenses, and the need of a larger revenue for the maintenance of the services and work of the church; and on May 13th the Finance Com- mittee presents a report calling for immediate and large retrenchment in the budget.
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Planning a Parish House
But the need of a parish house for the rapidly de- veloping parish work was pressing. Already in the year book of 1894 mention is made of the efforts which members of the congregation are making to raise funds for such a building and of a committee organized for that purpose. Finally, on June 10, 1895, in spite of the unfavorable condition of the treasury, the Vestry appointed a special Finance Committee to raise funds for a parish house and a Building Committee to pro- cure plans. Out of several plans presented, the Vestry selected, October 14, 1895, the plans of Mr. Carles T. Merry for a building estimated to cost $70,000. Towards this building $25,000 were realized by the sale of the remainder of the church land on Clendining Lane, and in 1896 the Vestry ordered the erection of half of the parish house, containing Sunday School rooms, gymnasium, church offices, guild rooms, and parlor, the most immediately necessary portions of the proposed building. The work began in July, 1896, and the building was occupied in June, 1897, the cost being $41,509.94, of which $25,000 was paid for by the sale of land, the remainder being derived from the contributions of the parish then and later. Lyceum Hall was removed, and the one-time tavern and general store, later added to by Dr. Peters and developed first into a house for the children of his institutions and then into a temporary parish house, which stood be- hind it facing old Bloomingdale Road, was turned about, moved down to 99th Street, and re-formed into a temporary rectory.
And here for some time the work of material better- ment halted. For seven years there had been a con- tinual demand for money for purposes of construction, and over $70,000 had been contributed by members
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of the parish and outside friends, a very large amount for a congregation as poor as that of St. Michael's. The section of the Parish House built in 1897 soon proved inadequate for the growing work of the parish, but it seemed impossible to secure funds for its com- pletion. The givers were exhausted or felt that they had given all they should be asked to give; and so for four years the Parish House remained incom- plete, only half of it constructed. Then, on October 14, 1901, the senior warden, William R. Peters, offered to complete the building, which, according to the orig- inal proposition contained in the appeal for money to construct the house, was to be a memorial to his father. His offer was accepted November 3, 1901, and the Parish House was dedicated to the service of God in memory of Thomas McClure Peters on All Saints' Day, November 1, 1902; and so the second work which he had bequeathed to his successor was accomplished.1
To show the general development and growth of the church work in the years covered by this chapter, I shall excerpt from the Vestry records, year books, and Messenger various miscellaneous items. Owing to the rapid growth of the neighborhood and the ineffi- ciency and lack of foresight of the city government, it came to pass by 1896 that the schools of this neigh- borhood were totally inadequate to provide for the number of children of school age. Classes were en- larged beyond the limits of efficiency and still hundreds of children were left unprovided for, many of them
1 Mr. Carles T. Merry having died in the meantime, Mr. R. W. Gibson, the architect of the church, became the architect of the completed Parish House. The original plan was also somewhat reduced in size, the erection of a separate library building for the Bloomingdale Library rendering the library contained in the original plans of the Parish House superfluous.
CON MANDORLE CLING
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THE MEMORIAL PARISH HOUSE Consecrated All Saints Day, 1902
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A Public School Annex
members of our own parish. In this emergency, October 12, 1896, the Vestry offered to the Board of Education, free of charge, the use during week-days of the larger portion of the buildings then used by it for temporary parish houses. The offer was unwillingly declined, because the buildings did not and could not be made to comply with the legal requirements for school buildings; but in the following year, when the first half of the Parish House was completed, the school board offered to lease and did lease the larger part of that building during week-days, and for two years it served as an annex public school. Not only, however, was there a lack of public schools in this neighborhood at that time, there were also no night schools whatever. To demonstrate the demand for such schools in this neighborhood, which we believed to be a necessity, Mr. Robert B. Keyser offered his services to conduct a night school in the temporary parish house of St. Michael's Church, and on February 8, 1897, rooms in that building were granted him for the purpose. The result of this ex- periment, and of active agitation by St. Michael's branch of C A I L, was that in the following year the Board of Education opened a night school in the nearest public school building in the neighborhood.
In 1897 the church came under the religious cor- poration act of 1895, according to which one warden and three vestrymen only are elected each year, the object being to secure greater permanence and con- tinuity in the Vestry, and thereby also better protection of property interests.
In 1900 the Vestry adopted the plan of assigning seats in the church. Many complained that it was not easy for families to sit together, and that, being
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seated one Sunday in one place and one in another, they did not acquire the home sense in connection with the church. It was the opinion also of the clergy that assignment of seats would prove an assistance in parochial administration, furnishing a sort of nucleus of persons anchored to the church by their sittings, and enabling the clergy and others to determine more readily the presence or absence of regular attendants and to ascertain who were strangers and newcomers. The method of assigning seats in use in our fellow free church of Zion and St. Timothy was therefore adopted in St. Michael's on December 10th of that year. Ac- cording to that method, sittings are assigned for the eleven o'clock service only, and in order of application, with no regard to the amount of the contribution of the applicant, which in fact no one but the rector knows, or whether he contributes at all. Such seats are not, however, in any sense, to be regarded as the property of those to whom they are assigned, but are available for their use only if they are present and in their seats before the clergy and choir enter the church. After that the ushers show people to all vacant seats without regard to any assignment.
In 1902, $25,000 was offered to the Vestry on con- dition that it should erect a small hospital building to be used in connection with the Clinic. This offer it was obliged to decline, since such a hospital would have made a new and somewhat considerable demand upon the annual budget, already so swollen by the expenses of the Parish House that each year the church was obliged to borrow from the Cemetery income, against the protest of the Treasurer and to the regret of the rector and Vestry. In the following year, 1903, occurred the forgery and defalcation of the treasurer's
I9I
Guilds and Organizations
assistant, by which the church lost over $40,000, the obligation of replacing which rendered still more difficult the financing of its large work. It was sup- posed before that time that the church had taken every precaution to guard against such a possibility. Every year the books had been audited by a professional auditor, but he had failed to note the fraud which was being perpetrated. Since that date still more careful methods have been adopted, including a monthly audit by the Auditing Committee of the Vestry, in ad- dition to the annual audit conducted for the Com- mittee by a professional auditor.
The former rector left a parish admirably organized. There were organizations to cover every phase of church work, and to furnish a means and place of activity and of recreation for church members of both sexes and all ages. These guilds and organizations were, for the most part, merely developed with the removal into the Parish House, and to this day the general scheme of organization of parish work existing in the last years of Dr. Peters's rectorship has been con- tinued. Some new organizations have of course come into existence during these fourteen years and others passed away. One interesting and rather unusual organization, started in 1892, Searchlight, did valuable work in the parish for the first eight years of the present rectorate. This was an organization of women who visited systematically, each having an allotted district, in the tenement and apartment houses, finding out people who had no church connection, children who did not go to Sunday School, men and women who needed the ministrations of the clergy, and at the same time ascertaining the sanitary and other condi- tions of those houses, with a view to curing or pre-
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venting moral and physical evil. Another organiza- tion of boys, which existed for a few years and did an admirable work during the period of its existence, was the Loving Service Society. The head of this organiza- tion contrived to inspire a large band of boys with an almost incredible zeal to do something for some one in the way of service. As is usually the case with or- ganizations of this sort, both Searchlight and Loving Service depended on the personality of their originators, and when these were unable to continue to lead the organizations they had started, on account of other obligations, those organizations themselves passed out of existence.
In 1895, at the suggestion and through the efforts of the rector's wife, to which are to be attributed also the Girls' Friendly Society and the Bloomingdale Day Nursery, a clothing bureau was started, which has continued to this day a valuable adjunct of the work of the parish, furnishing occupation to a number of women in making and mending garments, and ren- dering it possible for others to secure new clothing and half-worn garments at a low price. Out of the Clothing Bureau grew, in 1899, the Mothers' Meetings, which in their turn have resulted in a Women's Guild. A Men's Guild was organized in 1902. New organizations of young men have come into existence as a consequence of the facilities of the Parish House, in the form of gymnasium classes and military organizations, which latter seem especially to be the present fad among boys and young men. Debating clubs, camera clubs, dramatic guilds, and social organizations of one sort and another have come and gone, attesting and develop- ing the value of the Parish House as the workshop and the clubhouse of the parish.
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PARISH HOUSE WORK I. Girls' Friendly Society 2. Gymnasium Class
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Parish House Work
The Parish House has also been effective in the educational work of the church. And here, too, various agencies have grown up, continued, or been abandoned, as the needs of the movement and the assistance available indicated. The Sewing School, begun almost a half a century ago, was continued and largely developed in the present Parish House, serving a constituency drawn from the neighbor- hood at large, until about two years ago, when, in view of the introduction of industrial instruction in the public schools, and the difficulty of obtaining volunteer teachers who were willing and able to instruct the children on Saturday mornings, according to the modern scientific methods of sewing-school instruction, it seemed better to close our school. Sewing classes are maintained, however, in connection with a number of girls' guilds and organizations, together with dress- making, millinery, cooking, and other similar classes. Carpentry, and other similar industrial work, have also been introduced more and more, as opportunity per- mitted, in the boys' guilds and organizations. Last year a Bible Vacation School for the neighborhood was conducted in the Parish House, but as the Board of Education has located its vacation school for this district in the immediate neighborhood of the church it did not seem necessary to continue that enterprise. The rector of the church was, from its organization in 1899, for a number of years an active member of the Sunday School Commission of the Diocese, and the Sunday School has had the full advantage of the work of that commission, which it has been able to utilize effectively, thanks to the Parish House. The Sunday School rooms of the Parish House are almost ideal, and St. Michael's has one unique department in the
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Annals of St. Michael's
maps and models of the Jerusalem Chamber. We had for some years, also, the model mission room of the city. Here again we have an example of the possibili- ties of individuality in the work of such a parish. The person who originated and developed this department left the parish, and no one else grasped the work. Almost every year some new work originates or passes away, as workers with zeal, energy, and sympathetic originality come and go.
Outside of the parish, understood as the member- ship of the church, the Parish House has also been an active agency for good in the neighborhood at large, and in another chapter will be found an account of the neighborhood organizations developed from St. Mi- chael's Parish House as headquarters. The effort has been to make the Parish House not only a parish home but also a neighborhood guild house. Here have been held all sorts of meetings and gatherings for the public good, from single mass meetings to more permanent clubs and organizations, such as the Lincoln Club of boys of the Waring League, organized this spring to keep the streets clean and decent. The Parish House was also, in the time of the existence of that associa- tion, the home of the West Side Sunday Closing Asso- ciation, with delegates from various churches, and not a few other associations and organizations of a reformatory character have been allowed or encouraged to use its rooms for their meetings. Of these one of the most interesting was The Work Together, an association of builders, archi- tects, and representatives of the building trades, with a few members who represented the general benevolent public, and the rector of St. Michael's as president. This lasted for about two years,
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Change of Population
from 1900 to 1902, and was a power for peace in its day.
During the rectorship of the present incumbent, the population of the parish has not only very largely increased, it has also considerably changed. In the autumn of 1894, at the suggestion of the pastor of the West End Presbyterian Church, a religious census was made of the community of which this church is a part, from which it appeared that 24 per cent. of the total population hereabout claimed to be Episcopalians. The Roman Catholics outnumbered us in the lowest strata of the population and the Presbyterians almost equalled us among the richer classes (18 per cent.), but it was interesting to observe that Episcopalians, and Episcopalians only, were equally distributed through all strata of society, an evidence of the value of the work done in this city through the instrumentality of the City Mission Society.
With the organization of the Federation of Churches, St. Michael's Church took part with others in a more elaborate census of the entire 2 Ist Assembly District in the spring of 1898, and the rector of the parish became the president of the Auxiliary of the Federation for this district. The second census showed a considerable increase in the foreign and non-Protestant population of this section of the city. Some of the facts disclosed by that census were rather startling. Out of 379 families reported in the tier of blocks between 89th and 102d streets, and Broadway and the River, the most well-to-do section. of the district, 233 professed to have no church home, of whom 60 were Episcopalians, 36 Presbyterians, 28 Roman Catholics, and 21 Jews. Evidently there was. developing in New York, for this section of the city
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is not strange in that regard, a very large population, nominally Christian, without any real church connec- tion. Two later censuses have been made since that time, showing an increase rather than a decrease of the same conditions, and making evident the need of combination on the part of the churches if the com- munity is to be reached effectively. These censuses have shown a progressive increase in the Jewish population, especially of fairly well-to-do Jews; in certain sections numbers of Italians have come in; and on 99th Street a colored colony, almost 3000 strong, has located itself. There is no stratum of the population which would show to-day 24 per cent. of Episcopalians.
One result of the Federation work has been the districting of this section of the city, and the assign- ment, to each church of any kind willing to co-operate, of what is called a co-operative parish, a district in which it shall be the duty of that church to visit every house or apartment once in the year, reporting the results on blanks prepared for the purpose, so that all professing a preference for Presbyterianism may be fol- lowed up by the local Presbyterian Church, Methodists by the Methodist Church, and so on. Furthermore it is supposed to be the duty of each church to patrol its co-operative parish, so to speak, for the prevention or removal of evil conditions, moral or physical, all working together in the larger matters which affect the well-being, spiritual or temporal, of the district in general.
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