The History of First Presbyterian Church in Englewood, Part II

J. Wyman Jones, a New York lawyer originally from Utica, and a friend of William Sneeden, visited the English neighborhood during the time when the railroad was under construction. Along with others, he began to purchase farmland for the purpose of subdividing it for the construction of homes. In the spring of 1859 the name "Englewood" was chosen, and at about the same time the Rev. Jarnes H. Wilder Dwight came to live in the area. Initially, he and his first wife boarded in the Dutch stone farmhouse now known as the DeMott-Westervelt House on Grand Avenue opposite Forest Avenue. In July of 1859, a subscription was taken to raise funds to provide a chapel in which Christians could meet for religious services. On March 25, 1860, a chapel, the first religious edifice in Englewood, was dedicated. Built on a prominent site at the top of the first rise of the East Hill, the 25 x 50 building held about 200 worshippers.

The Rev. Dwight served as Pastor at informal gatherings until June 13, 1860 when he accepted the nomination to be the Pastor of "The Presbyterian Church of Englewood, New Jersey," as the congregation voted to call itself. This was the first Presbyterian Church in New Jersey to be under the care of the 4th Presbytery of New York, and was the first Presbyterian congregation in Bergen County. The Rev. Dwight was, by all accounts, dutiful and patriotic, and during the Civil War, from 1861 to 1863, served as a Chaplain in the 66th Regiment of New York State Volunteers. He returned to serve his church until 1867 when he resigned because of ill health.

The Rev. Henry M. Booth, D.D. became the 2nd Pastor on Sept. 19, 1867. The youngest son of Englewood resident, William A. Booth, and a graduate of Union Theological Seminary, he was immensely respected by the congregation. During his 24-year tenure, the Church membership increased greatly. According to Stuart Lyman, writing in 1935, the Rev. Booth was a "discreet" man and "interested in everything which went on in Church and Village. He managed his session so that even the most opinionated of them was brought around to his point of view painlessly"

Built of random coursed rough-hewn red sandstone ashlar, the chapel was twice enlarged at its original location. The 1865 addition was built of wood on the east side of the south end. In 1877, before the construction of the Vermilye Memorial Chapel, the building was dismantled and moved to Brookside Cemetery. When reconstructed there, it was turned around so that the original end is now south and the entrance is on the east, rather than west. Brookside Chapel, with its diamond-paned lancet windows is the purest example of early ecclesiastic Gothic Revival architecture in the city and one of the finest 19th Century buildings in Englewood.

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Last updated: 11/25/02