Parish History
S. Stephen's Church was first organized January 31, 1839, and was admitted to the diocesan convention in July of the same year. [2] The next year, the first permanent structure for the parish was erected at the northwest corner of Transit St. and Benefit St.
S. Stephen's traces its high church roots back to the yearlong tenure of the Reverend George Leeds, who instituted the first beginnings of Anglo-Catholic tradition at S. Stephens (three years before the founding of the Church of the Advent, the most significant tractarian church in the region. Such leanings were publicly condemned by the Bishop of Rhode Island, and Leeds departed soon after. [2]
Rev. Henry Waterman, himself a graduate of Brown University, was also of the tractarian tradition, as was his successor, Rev. James Eames. In 1850, Rev. Waterman returned for a second term as rector, with the vestry looking to expand to a new location. During the first years of Waterman's second tenure, the African-American parish of Christ Church, Providence, was forced to disband, and the communicants were transferred to S. Stephen's, marking one of the earliest instances of parochial integrations in America. [3]
Following the confirmation and election to the vestry of several members of Providence's elite families, such as Robert Ives Jr. and Robert Goddard, the parish purchased the lot which it occupies today. The lot, purchased in January of 1860 for $12,093.12 (just under $500,000 in 2025 USD), was only a few hundred feet from Brown University. Funding for the new building came from a variety of sources, ranging from notable Providence financier John Carter Brown to a large number of middle-class and lower-class parishioners. [2]
On Saint Matthew’s Day, September 21, 1860, the cornerstone of the new building was laid, though its location has since been lost. [2] The church was consecrated February 27, 1862.
The Church Building
The church building, a large stone Gothic Revival structure, was designed by Richard Upjohn and built in 1860–62. [4] In 1889 the congregation received a major bequest from Henry J. Steere, a prominent philanthropist.
S. Stephen's represents an early example of the American Gothic Revival, and exhibits many traditional traits of the movement, such as the solid columns, window tracery, high side aisles, wide nave, and the building's overall proportions. The church is asymmetrical, with a second aisle on the south side of the building serving as a Lady chapel.
The church building was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1973. [1]
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