Church Anniversary

THE Church of Christ at Dartmouth College observed the 175th anniversary of its founding Sunday evening, January 20, at the church building on College Street.

The exercises were divided into two parts. The first, held in the church auditorium, comprised a brief service of worship, at which special musical numbers of historical interest were presented by the church choir and by a group from the Dartmouth Glee Club. At the conclusion of this service the audience adjourned to the Kate Sanborn Room, where incidents from the history of the church, illustrated by lantern slides, were recounted by Professors F. L. Childs 06 and E. B. Watson '02.

The Church of Christ at Dartmouth College was gathered by Eleazar Wheelock January 23, 1771, only five months after his arrival on Hanover Plain. Dr. Wheelock was the first pastor, and has been followed in the pastorate by fifteen other ministers. The longest term of service was that of Rev. Samuel P. Leeds, who came to the church in iB6O and retired forty years later, in 1900, but was retained as pastor until his death in 1910. Rev. Chester B. Fisk is the present minister.

For the first 24 years of its existence the church had no building of its own, but met in the original college hall and the first college chapel. In 1795 the old white meetinghouse was erected as the north end of the campus and remained the home of the church until its destruction by fire in 1931. For most of those 136 years it served not only as a sanctuary for the church but also as an auditorium for the College. The present building on College Street was erected in 1935.