Church of Our Saviour (Mechanicsburg, Ohio)
Church Of Our Savior | |
NRHP reference No. | 85001878[1] |
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Added to NRHP | August 29, 1985 |
The Church of Our Saviour is a historic Episcopal parish in the village of Mechanicsburg, Ohio, United States. Founded in the 1890s, it is one of the youngest congregations in the village, but its Gothic Revival-style church building that was constructed soon after the parish's creation has been named a historic site.
Organic history
The first settlers in Goshen Township arrived circa 1805,[2]: 586 and Mechanicsburg was platted on 6 August 1814.[2]: 596 Organized religion was rare in the earliest years; the first churches were established by circuit-riding preachers from the Methodist Episcopal Church, who founded small religious classes that met in settlers' log cabins.[2]: 591 Mechanicsburg's first church was a Methodist congregation organized in 1814,[2]: 598 and by the 1880s the village boasted four additional churches: Baptist, black Baptist, African Methodist Episcopal, and Methodist Protestant.[2]: 600
Architecture
Constructed in 1893,[3]: 513 dedicated in 1894,[4]: 48 and rededicated in 1895,[3]: 513 the Church of Our Saviour is a Gothic Revival structure.[1] In its early years, its pipe organ, brass altar, and windows were deemed its most distinctive elements,[3]: 513 all of which prompted a local author to declare that "both the exterior and interior are very attractive" in 1907.[4]: 48 Built of brick on a stone foundation and featuring elements of wood and stone,[6] the single-story church is covered with a composite roof rising to a central gable. The windows that attracted the attention of authors in the early twentieth century are stained glass; most are ogive windows, but the center of the facade features a rose window. A square brick tower with a wooden belfry sits at one corner of the building; additional stained glass windows are placed in the tower, and ornamental wooden carvings adorn the belfry.[7] Architecturally, it is not unique; three of Mechanicsburg's five historic church buildings were constructed in the 1890s,[8]: 6 and four of the five are brick buildings with stained-glass ogive windows.[8]: 2
Recent history
The Church of Our Saviour was listed on the
A member parish of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, the Church of Our Saviour is within the jurisdiction of the Diocese of Southern Ohio. It forms a part of the Northwest Deanery, along with the Church of the Epiphany and four other parishes.[9] Together with the Church of the Epiphany, it forms the "Northern Miami Valley Episcopal Cluster";[10] the two parishes share a priest.[11]
References
- ^ a b c d "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
- ^ a b c d e The History of Champaign County, Ohio. Chicago: Beers, 1881.
- ^ a b c d e f Middleton, Evan P., ed. History of Champaign County Ohio: Its People, Industries and Institutions. Vol. 1. Indianapolis: Bowen, 1917.
- ^ a b c d Ware, Joseph. History of Mechanicsburg, Ohio. Columbus: Heer, 1917.
- ^ Journal of the Twenty-fifth Annual Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Southern Ohio, Held in All Saint's Church, Portsmouth, May 17-18, 1899. Cincinnati: Carpenter, 1899, 79.
- Ohio Historical Society, 2007. Accessed 2013-01-28.
- ^ Owen, Lorrie K., ed. Dictionary of Ohio Historic Places. Vol. 1. St. Clair Shores: Somerset, 1999, 113-114.
- ^ a b c Recchie, Nancy. National Register of Historic Places Inventory/Nomination: Mechanicsburg Multiple Resource Area. National Park Service, December 1984.
- ^ Deaneries Archived 2013-05-18 at the Wayback Machine, Diocese of Southern Ohio, n.d. Accessed 2013-01-29.
- ^ Locations Archived 2015-02-23 at the Wayback Machine, Northern Miami Valley Episcopal Cluster, 2012. Accessed 2013-01-29.
- ^ Staff & Leadership Archived 2015-02-23 at the Wayback Machine, Northern Miami Valley Episcopal Cluster, 2012. Accessed 2013-01-29.