Alexander Street Baptist Church was a Baptist church in Toronto, Ontario, Canada located on the south side of Alexander Street between Yonge and Church streets. [1] The congregation was founded in 1866 and the church building, designed by Henry Langley, was completed the following year. When the congregation relocated in 1888, it was sold to the Anglican Church and eventually demolished in the mid-1950s.
Alexander Street Baptist Church was founded October 23, 1866 by 27 members from Bond Street Baptist Church. Alexander Street was the first congregation of what was to be many Baptist congregations formed in the next 40–50 years within Toronto from the original Bond Street congregation. The church building, designed in the Gothic Revival style by the architectural firm of Thomas Gundry and Henry Langley, was opened March 24, 1867 and seated 480 people. [2] The $10,500 cost of its construction was largely met by a donation from Thomas Lailey who owned a wholesale clothing business in Toronto. Lailey was also a major contributor to the church's running expenses over the years. [3] [4]
George McNutt (1867) was the first pastor of Alexander Street Baptist Church. (Hoyes Lloyd the editor of the Canadian Baptist since 1863 had been the interim pastor in 1866 and was formerly from Port Hope, Ontario). Andrew Heber Munro became its second pastor in 1869 and remained in his post for seven years, leaving to take over the pastorship of the First Baptist Church in Montreal. [5] Following Munro's departure, the church was without a pastor for year until the arrival of his successor, Joshua Denovan (1829-1901) in 1878 who served until 1893 after the congregation had relocated (he resigned briefly due to health from 1888 to 1892 and W. H. Cline served in the interim). According to John Ross Robertson writing in Landmarks of Toronto:
The coming of Mr. Denovan at once infused new life into the church, and it reconstructed itself and entered upon a career of remarkable activity and, in one sense, has done a work that no other church in this city has accomplished. The Alexander street church occupies a unique position on the mission work, and has gained for itself a most enviable reputation in this respect. With a spirit of self-sacrifice, distinctively Christian and yet exceptional among churches, it has given away one dollar for missions for every dollar spent for its own upbuilding. In other Baptist churches $13 is used for the home church to $1 for missions, and in others $7 to $1. [6]
The church sponsored a mission school outreach at Dovercourt Road Baptist Church which began in 1879 and organized as a congregation in April 1881. A building was eventually opened for use in September 1889 at the north-west corner of Dovercourt road and Argyle street. [7] An outreach was also begun at 148 Tecumseth Street south (west of Queen and Bathurst streets) (also called Memorial Baptist Church), which is today occupied by the Ukrainian Baptist Church congregation.
In 1888 the Alexander Street congregation experienced growth and decided to relocate and build a new church at Jarvis and Wellesley Streets. The new church building opened in 1889 and was renamed Immanuel Baptist Church. [8] The Alexander Street church building was sold to the Anglican Church and was used as the Toronto Church School until 1904 when the school merged with the St. Alban's School. Eaton's acquired the building and leased it to a succession of businesses, with its final use being storage for Eaton's. The church was demolished in 1954 when the south side of Alexander Street was razed to make way for the City Park apartment complex. [2]
The Metropolitan Tabernacle is a large independent Reformed Baptist church in the Elephant and Castle in London. It was the largest non-conformist church of its day in 1861. The Tabernacle Fellowship have been worshipping together since 1650. Its first pastor was William Rider; other notable pastors and preachers include Benjamin Keach, John Gill, John Rippon and C. H. Spurgeon. The Tabernacle still worships and holds to its Biblical foundations and principles under its present pastor, Peter Masters.
The Randolph Theatre is a 518 seat theatre in Toronto, Ontario, that is housed in a former church. The Gothic revival building is located at 736 Bathurst Street at the intersection with Lennox Street. The theatre is in the former church sanctuary, while the 100-seat Annex Theatre is in an adjoining building at 730 Bathurst Street.
The Bethel Church is a historically-black Baptist megachurch in Jacksonville, Florida, in the United States. Founded in 1838, it is the city's oldest Baptist congregation. The attendance is 12,000 members. The senior pastor is Bishop Rudolph W. McKissick Jr. The historic church building is on the National Register of Historic Places.
College Street Baptist Church was a Baptist church at the northwest corner of College Street and Palmerston Boulevard in the Little Italy neighbourhood of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Yorkminster Park Baptist Church is a Baptist church located in Toronto's Deer Park, Canada. It is affiliated with Canadian Baptists of Ontario and Quebec.
The First Baptist Church is a historic American Baptist Churches USA congregation, established in 1665. It is one of the oldest Baptist churches in the United States. It first met secretly in members homes, and the doors of the first church were nailed shut by a decree from the Puritans in March 1680. The church was forced to move to Noddle's Island. The church was forced to be disguised as a tavern and members traveled by water to worship. Rev. Dr. Stillman led the church in the North End for over 40 years, from 1764 to 1807. The church moved to Beacon Hill in 1854, where it was the tallest steeple in the city. After a slow demise under Rev. Dr. Rollin Heber Neale, the church briefly joined with the Shawmut Ave. Church, and the Warren Avenue Tabernacle, and merged and bought the current church in 1881, for $100,000.00. Since 1882 it has been located at the corner of Commonwealth Avenue and Clarendon Street in the Back Bay. The interior is currently a pending Boston Landmark through the Boston Landmarks Commission.
Historic First Bryan Baptist Church is an African-American church that was organized in Savannah, Georgia, by Andrew Bryan in 1788. Considered to be the Mother Church of Black Baptists, the site was purchased in 1793 by Bryan, a former slave who had also purchased his freedom. The first structure was erected there in 1794. By 1800 the congregation was large enough to split: those at Bryan Street took the name of First African Baptist Church, and Second and Third African Baptist churches were also established. The current sanctuary of First Bryan Baptist Church was constructed in 1873.
Henry Langley was a Canadian architect based in Toronto. He was active from 1854 to 1907. Among the first architects born and trained in Canada, he was a founding members of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts in 1880 and was instrumental in establishing the Ontario Association of Architects in 1889. A conservative in architectural design, he is primarily known for designing numerous churches in the Toronto area, although he designed many secular buildings as well including residential, commercial and public buildings. Langley designed 70 churches throughout Ontario. He was the first chair of the Department of Architecture at the University of Toronto, where he taught during the 1880s and 1890s.
West Presbyterian Church was a congregation and two houses of worship in Manhattan, New York City. The congregation was founded in 1829 and merged in 1911 with Park Presbyterian Church to form West-Park Presbyterian Church. The first house of worship, also known as the Carmine Street Presbyterian Church, in Greenwich Village, was used from 1832 to 1865, and the second, on West 42nd Street between Fifth Avenue and Sixth Avenue, from 1865 until 1911, when it was sold and demolished. Proceeds from the sale were used, in accordance with the merger agreement, to build and endow a church for an underserved neighborhood, Washington Heights: Fort Washington Presbyterian Church. In addition, the West Church congregation had earlier established two mission churches which eventually merged to become Good Shepherd-Faith Presbyterian Church. West-Park, Fort Washington, and Good Shepherd-Faith are all active today.
The Jarvis Street Baptist Church is a Baptist church located at the intersection of Gerrard Street and Jarvis Street in downtown Toronto. One of the oldest churches in the city, its congregation was founded in 1818, and the present church constructed in 1875. It is a member of the Sovereign Grace Fellowship of Canada.
Bond Street Baptist Church built originally in 1848 represented the first permanently established Baptist congregation in the city of Toronto, Canada.
Elmore Harris was a Canadian Baptist pastor. He was the founder of the Walmer Road Baptist Church and one of the founders of Toronto Bible Training School in 1894 which soon changed its name to Toronto Bible College.
Walmer Road Baptist Church is a Baptist in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is affiliated with Canadian Baptists of Ontario and Quebec.
Robert Alexander Fyfe was a strong church builder, writer, and first Principal of the Canadian Literary Institute.
William Boyd Stewart was a pastor, writer, and educator in the Baptist denomination of Canada.
Archibald Campbell Douglas was a Scottish architect based primarily in Glasgow. He designed many churches in Glasgow and Edinburgh, especially those for the Free Church of Scotland.
The King Khalid Building is an event space in the Southside, Edinburgh, Scotland, owned and operated by the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. The building was constructed Roxburgh Free Church in 1847 and converted to its current use in 1982.
Immanuel Lutheran College was an educational institution of the Evangelical Lutheran Synodical Conference of North America whose main purpose was to train Black men to be pastors and both men and women to be teachers. It was founded in Concord, North Carolina, in 1903 and relocated to Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1905. The college was closed in 1961 when the Synodical Conference decided that the training of Blacks should be integrated into the educational institutions of the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS), the largest member of the conference. The former campus was purchased by North Carolina A&T State University.
Pleasance Church was a Presbyterian church on the Pleasance in the Southside of Edinburgh, Scotland. Originating in the Relief Church in the 1820s, the congregation united with Charteris Memorial in 1953.