The First Presbyterian Church at
Christian Hook was organized and dedicated to God on October
31, 1871. Its First Corporate Meeting
was held on February 25, 1871, and the incorporation papers
subsequently filed on July 8, 1871.
Our church is descended from the
Presbyterian Churches in Hempstead and Freeport. As early
as 1844, a Sunday School was conducted
in the Oceanside public school located diagonally across
the street from our present church
property. This endeavor found its initial support from Christ's
First Presbyterian Church in Hempstead.
Additional support for the Sunday School was later given
by the First Presbyterian Church of
Freeport. In 1868, after 23 years as a Sunday School, Mr. Wright
Pearsall, the Sunday School
superintendent, invited The Rev. Marcus Burr, pastor of the Freeport
Church, to lead regular worship
services after Sunday School. Rev. Burr agreed, and when our
church formally organized, he became
its first pastor.
The original building was built during
the summer of 1871 and is still a part of our present structure.
The front of the church is the same,
but the sanctuary extended only to the steps of the present
chancel. The pulpit was elevated and
located near the present front door. In the beginning there
was no instrumental church music, and
the church bell was not installed until 1874. Land for the
building was donated by Townsend F.
Southard and the church erected at a total of $2,300.
Through the years, many improvements
and enlargements have been made. The first was in
1892 when the present chancel area and
the south entrance were added. The chancel area was
used for Sunday School and a nursery,
and the new entrance afforded carriages the ability to discharge
worshippers under the portico in times
of inclement weather.
In 1913 and 1914, the sanctuary was
remodeled after the chapel at Union Theological Seminary
in New York. Church services were held
at the Salamander Fire House during this renovation. In
August 1914, the beautiful stained
glass window was dedicated to The Rev. Marcus Burr. Mr. Burr
preached his final sermon in our church
on that day. Seven weeks later he died and was buried
in Hillside Cemetery in Bridgeport,
Connecticut. The present organ, the first pipe organ in Oceanside,
was purchased and operated manually
until its electrification in 1939.
The next physical improvement occurred
in 1925 when the parish hall was started. It was
completed in two stages, the basement
being built in 1925, with the remainder completed in 1929.
The parish hall contained the only
basketball court besides the one in School #1 in Oceanside, and
many of the old-timers remember playing
on it. As a result of the construction of the parish hall,
the stable in back of the church was
torn down, and later in 1928, the outdoor sanitary facilities
were declared "unsafe" and were
removed. The parish hall was and still is the focal point of all
our church activities except worship.
Although, in 1962, when another renovation of the sanctuary
was undertaken, worship was held in the
parish hall. In 1929 additional land was purchased which
is now the parking lot. An effort was
made at that time to purchase the land where the stores are
now, but the trustees were outbid. A
final land acquisition was made in 1947, on which the manse
was erected in 1951.
Two other memorable improvements have
been made. The first was the installation of stained
glass windows in the sanctuary in 1937,
and the second was the renovation of the parish hall and
adding the connecting link from the
church to the parish hall in 1966. The stained glass windows
were designed by the minister at that
time, The Rev. Humphrey Walt. The south windows depict
Faith, Hope and Charity and the north
windows represent the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke
and John. Two other windows were also
designed, one being emblematic of the Ten Commandments,
the other an open Bible. The 1977
building program produced the church plant as it is today.
Our church is the first and oldest in
Oceanside. It has seen many changes in our town as it
has grown from a community of small
farms and bay people to a busy suburb of New York City.
Through the years it has provided a
place for many people, young and old, to enrich their lives
and renew their covenants with the
Creator. May God continue to grant us the grace to grow not
only in numbers, but in joy and
devotion to the Lord, that this Church may be more than a building
and become a source of strength and
faith unending to our brothers and sisters in Christ, to our
community of Oceanside, and to the
world.
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