First Baptist Church in America
The Meeting House
The Meeting House was built in 1774 - 1775. Its size and beauty indicated that the direction of Baptist work in Providence had come under the dynamic leadership of James Manning.
Dr. Manning had been dispatched by the Philadelphia Baptist Association to Rhode Isladn to start a Baptist college and to collect some of the Baptist churches in New England to a Regular Baptist association. As a result, Brown University was founded in 1764, and the Warren Baptist Association started. In 1770, the college moved to Providence, and the "College Edifice" (now called "University Hall") was built. Dr. Manning became pastor of Providence's Baptist church and one of the consequnces of his pastorate was the building of the Meeting House.
Orginally when the structure was built, there were no rooms on the ground floor except a rough cellar dug into the hillside. The town hearse was stored there and was rolled out the front doors of the meetinghouse when needed. Local businessmen sometimes rented the space for storage; for example, the town's undertaker stored barrels of rum there at one time. Finally in 1819, a Sunday school was started, and the entire basement area was eventually excavated to make classrooms.
The Meeting House benefited from political troubles in Massachusetts on the eve of the American Revolution. The Boston Tea Party took place in December 1773; and the British responded with the Coercive Acts in the Spring of 1774, which among other things closed the port of Boston. As a result, Boston's ship builders and carpenters were idled just as consturction on this building was started. Many of those men came to Providence to work on what was the greatest bulding project in all of New England at the time.
The 185 foot steeple was put up in 3 1/2 days. It was constructed in sections on the ground and then pulled up, like a telescope exteneded, one section through the other. It has withstood the winters adn hurricanes since 1775, making it almost the only steeple in Providence tht has not fallen to wind and lightning. In September 2002, the steeple was fully lighted for the first time, making is a beacon in the city at night.
This is one of the largest church structures built in colonial America. It was built to seat 1,200 people, even though Providence, in 177775, was a town of only 4,321 and the Baptist church had less than 150 members. However, the Baptists expected to continue to grow as a result of the revivals that had swept the colonies in the preceding decades. Also, the building was erected to be used for the graduation exercises of the new Baptist college (Brown University). In addition, some of the builders were leading figures in the town of Providence, and they wanted to erect a meetinghouse to match their expectations for Providence itself. The structure was one of several large buldings erected between 17760 and 1820 as Providence challenged and surpassed Newport to became the leading town in southern New England.