Extended notes on the Methodist congregations associated with the State Street Methodist Episcopal Church (now Christ Church, United Methodist.)
Third Street Methodist Episcopal Church, corner 3rd and Monroe Streets, South Troy.
In March 1844, trustees were elected for a separate congregation named “the Third Street Methodist Episcopal Society of the City of Troy” and a Sunday School was organized. The following year “a lot on the northeast corner of Third and Monroe Streets was purchased by the society to build a church. “ (Hillman, p.96) “The small society which had organized in 1843, began its erection in 1847(…) On Christmas day, that year, the building was dedicated.” (Hillman p. 66)
“The origin of the Third Street Methodist Episcopal Church can be traced to a statement made by William Barrett, a class-leader of the State Street Church, at the leaders’ meeting held on May 2, 1842 (…) he suggested the suitableness of the house belonging to him in that part of the city for preaching.” “ In1873, the church was enlarged by the construction of a lower story of brick, on which the wooden structure of the first edifice was placed.” (Hillman, 96-99)
Prayer meetings had been conducted in William Barrett’s house for a while, and when Daniel Hudson, an experienced Sunday School Superintendent, moved “from the northern part of the city,” a class of Methodists was formed. A “class” was the usual Methodist term for a neighborhood group of adults and families with children. The Trustees of the State Street congregation, seeing the success of the class, started to look for a building in earnest, meanwhile paying William Barrett for the use of his house for prayer meetings, preaching and a Sunday School. This saved South Troy participants from trudging the one mile each way to the State Street church, or not quite as far a walk for many – but up a steep hill – to Levings Chapel.
Like other new congregations, the decision came at a time of dissension that pew rentals were being charged in the State Street building, usually reported by Hillman as temporary fees to pay for new buildings, but always mentioned with hints that the decision was not universally approved. Certainly the cost to rent a pew could have dissuaded attendance by the workers of South Troy, many of whom worked in the steel mills and foundries of the area. In fact, Hillman tells us this would-be congregation decided not to accept State Street’s appeal for money for their building, but to create its own Board of Trustees and become a separate church.
In October, 1844, the Sunday School reported having 15 teachers, in addition to two superintendents – one for males and one for females – and a secretary-librarian, even though Hillman estimates membership of the society being around 35, with 75 students in the Sunday School. The first sermons were preached on the steps of the partially-built church, and the sanctuary was dedicated on Christmas Day, 1847.
After a time as a separate charge, the congregation reunited with State Street and operated under the name of Wesley Chapel. When attendance climbed again, peaking at 151, under the able leadership of its superintendent, Daniel Klock Jr., they once again took a minister and revived their Third Street name. The Sunday School had 288 members in 1888, and the school rooms were enlarged. Sadly, it was not to last.
The congregation which had struggled, revived, and struggled and thrived for a few years, then struggled again, closing its doors at the end of the19th century, not so long after its best years.
Saint Nicholas Ukrainian Orthodox Church, with a similar shaped, but brick, building now occupies the lot.
Line drawings and quotations are from “The History of Methodism in Troy” by Joseph Hillman, 1888, available as a PDF, free of charge, at a number of online archives, including the Library of Congress. Photographs are the author’s.
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