Built 1910-11 Designated NYCL Jul 13, 1993 Area 3,642 m² | NRHP Reference # 08000933 Address New York, NY 10030, USA Added to NRHP 25 September 2008 | |
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Location 210-216 West 134th Street
Manhattan, New York City Architectural style Gothic Revival architecture Architects Vertner Woodson Tandy, George Washington Foster Similar Mother African Methodist, John Street Methodist Church, St Aloysius Catholic Church, Villa Lewaro, Church of the Intercession | ||
St. Philip's Episcopal Church is a historic Episcopal church located at 204 West 134th Street, between Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard and Frederick Douglass Boulevard in the Harlem neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Its congregation was founded in 1809 in the notorious Five Points neighborhood by free Africans worshiping at Trinity Church, Wall Street as the Free African Church of St. Philip, and is the oldest black Episcopal parish in New York City. Historically, it was an extremely influential institution in Harlem.
The first church foundation stone was laid in 1819, and the first rector from 1826 to 1840 was the Rev. Peter Williams, Jr., a leading abolitionist. The "first two sites were on Centre Street. In 1822, a brick building replaced the original wood frame church damaged by fire. This same building would undergo two more reconstructions. In 1834, irate whites vandalized the church and in 1863, New York City police used the church as a barracks for militia and police handling draft riots. By 1886 the church was located on 25th Street." It sold this property c.1909 for $600,000, and with this money was able to buy the site of the current church, as well as 10 apartment buildings on West 135th Street which has previously been restricted to whites only. The reredos of the current church came from the church on 25th Street.
The present church building was designed by architects Vertner Woodson Tandy and George Washington Foster of the firm Tandy & Foster. Both were prominent African-American architects: Tandy being the first African-American architect licensed to practice in New York State and Foster being among the first licensed by the State of New Jersey. It was built in 1910-1911 in the Neo-Gothic style.
Notable parishioners of St. Philip's include W. E. B. Du Bois, Thurgood Marshall, and Langston Hughes.
The church was designated a New York City Landmark in 1993, and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2008.