310 SOUTH JEFFERSON AVENUE
GRACE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH
Site 7
(Formerly Jefferson Avenue United Methodist Church)
Constructed 1867, Architect: A. Barrows & Garnsey, Chicago, Illinois
Chapel, 1960, Architect: Frederick W. Wigen and Associates, Saginaw, Michigan
The congregation was organized in 1852 and in 1867 ground was broken on this Gothic Revival Church. The first service was held in the building on August 7, 1868. The sanctuary seats 900 people and is located on the second floor above the noise and activity of the street.
Originally the building had a steeple rising to 162 feet - higher than any other structure in the city. It was toppled by a storm in 1896. According to newspaper accounts “residents in the neighborhood long feared the tall spire which overtopped them to dizzy height and some of them [said] they are not sorry it has disappeared, especially since no loss of life was occasioned by its fall.” The tower was repaired and reconstructed without a steeple. The current steeple was constructed in 1987 - it is not as tall as the original steeple.
In 2008, the church was renamed Grace United Methodist Church.
Map
Sources
Saginaw Weekly Enterprise 15 March 1866. 3.
Dedication Article. Saginaw Daily Courier 28 December 1868.
Cartwright, Lloyd J. Our Little Brown Church: The Jefferson Avenue Untied Methodist Church of Saginaw, Michigan.
Saginaw, Michigan: The Jefferson Avenue United Methodist Church. 1978.
"Methodist Parsonage." The Saginaw News 11 August 1940. 9.