Emmanuel Episcopal Church

The story

Written by AI from this property's National Register nomination and the record above; every sentence is checked against its sources before it appears here. Corrections: privacy@treealive.com

Emmanuel Episcopal Church is a Late Gothic Revival church at 203 S. Kensington Ave. in LaGrange, built in 1925 and 1926; the Building Committee chose John Neal Tilton, Jr. and Bertram Goodhue Associates as architects. It was listed in the National Register in 2018.

Why it's listed

It was listed under criterion C, with local-level significance in architecture and art. Its period of significance runs from 1925 to 1962, reflecting the 1925-1926 construction of the worship space and the 1962 South Building.

Physical character

Its walls are random ashlar Indiana limestone and brick, its roofs slate, copper and composition, over a concrete foundation. It is cruciform in plan, with a 118 foot bell tower, an eighteen-foot fleche and carved lion gargoyles. In the 1970s the transepts became a Baptistery and the Upper Room, and in 1979 a salvaged altar from the Church of Our Savior was added to the high altar area.

Historical context

A 1924 fire destroyed the congregation's earlier church; the vestry met within twelve hours and parishioners pledged $94,000 within forty-eight hours, and the new church held its first service on Easter Sunday, April 4, 1926. Basset T. Cadwallader wired the town's first electrically lit Christmas tree in the church in 1885.