Our Building
The Carpenter's Son
Our building, which is Norman Gothic in style, was designed by the distinguished architects Alexander Jackson Davis and Russell Warren. Constructed in 1838 at a cost of about $40,000, it required 7,000 tons of granite, some blocks weighing as much as eight tons. The style of the interior details are Gothic, yet the spaciousness of the well-lighted interior and the simplicity and precision of the decorative elements have much in common with the Greek revival designs of same period. In 1868 a chapel was added behind the church. In 1896 the Parish House was constructed with a style of architecture matching the original church building. In 1955 office space and meeting rooms were constructed in the basement.
The meeting room, or sanctuary, itself has gone through several renovations and stylistic changes. The original stained glass was replaced in the mid- to late-19th C. The organ was first in the front of the church, to right of the pulpit; it was moved to the organ loft in the late 19th C. The original paint scheme used bright borders and decorations; the elaborate plaster ceiling mouldings were added in the late 19th C. The original chancel featured a lower, more open, pulpit; and there was a raised platform in front of the pulpit for the altar table. The original stained glass window behind the pulpit was replaced with a Tiffany glass mosaic. For many years, the pews were covered in bright red brocade; this was replaced in 1967, with the current soft gold fabric.
The mosaic behind the pulpit was given in 1911 as a memorial to Judge and Mrs. Oliver Prescott by their three children, Oliver Prescott, Jr., Mrs. Frederick Stetson and Miss Mary R. Prescott. Frederick Wilson was the artist who made the design for the Tiffany Studios. A Pilgrim ascending a dangerous mountain pass is guided on his way by a Guardian Angel. It is the largest and most intricate work of its kind in America, covering over 300 square feet of wall space, and containing many thousands of pieces of Favrile glass set in cement.
The three portrait busts at the front of the sanctuary are of William J. Potter (niche front left), Ralph Waldo Emerson (niche front right) and Orville Dewey (pedestal front left). None is a remarkable work of art, but each is of historical significance.
Tiffany Mosaic
The impressive favrile glass mosaic behind the pulpit in the Sanctuary of The First Unitarian Church in New Bedford was given in 1911 as a memorial to Judge Oliver Prescott and his wife Helen Augusta Howland Prescott by their three children: Oliver Prescott, Jr., Mrs. Frederick Stetson and Miss Mary R. Prescott.
The composition was drawn from Eliza Scudder’s famous hymn, “Thy Grace Divine,” the second verse:
When over the dizzy heights we go
One soft hand blinds our eyes,
The other leads us safe and slow,
O love of God most wise!
Eliza Scudder, who had died only a few years before, wrote powerful devotional hymns in her early Unitarian years. She was a niece of the famous Unitarian minister, Edmund Hamilton Sears, who wrote “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear.” The mosaic shows a pilgrim high on a craggy mountain trail, facing a narrow, dangerous path. Behind him stands a bright angel spirit of God, to guide him “safe and slow” as the path grows steep and the way more difficult.
Thousands of pieces of Favrile glass set in cement portray a beautiful landscape depicting a deep ravine lined on either side with massive trees, luxuriant foliage and bold rocks. The peace and tranquility of the valley is disturbed by the motion and murmur of a little stream seen winding its way through the fertile valley.
The Prescott-Howland Families
Judge Oliver Prescott (1806-1890), a Harvard Law School graduate, was known for his thorough scholarship, immense learning, scrupulous fairness and his generous spirit. He was an excellent lawyer, called upon often by others who needed careful guidance through the thickets of law from common law to admiralty, courteous and utterly imperturbable. Judge Prescott disliked litigation and full dress court battles so spent most of his career as a lawyer and judge in probate court. Known as “the peacemaker of Water Street’ (where his office was), he infinitely preferred to persuade would be litigants to negotiate instead. Judge Prescott was a devoted member, frequent officer, and deacon of First Unitarian Church.
With his wife, Helen who outlived him by eighteen years, they helped buy the freedom of the wives and children of escaped slaves, contributed generously to the raising of troops for the North in the Civil War, and to the Sanitary Commission to whom often fell the provisioning and medical care of the soldiers. Helen’s family was a prominent one in New Bedford, her father a successful oil merchant.
The first Prescott arrived here in New Bedford in 1828 to practice law before the building of the First Unitarian Church, which they joined, was completed.
The Artist
The mosaic commissioned by the Prescott children from the Louis Comfort Tiffany Studios, was created by the chief artist of the Studio, Frederick Wilson (1858-1932) already justly famous for many stunning stained glass windows. In its time it was the “largest and most intricate work of its kind in America,” requiring more than a year to complete. The Tiffany Studios featured it in full color on the cover of their 1911 brochure.
Among Wilson’s designs include windows that were displayed at the 1893 Chicago Exposition. His predilection was for figurative windows and mosaics as demonstrated by his work on the following projects: “The Ascension,” “The Archangel Raphael” and “Christ Blessing the Little Children.” He also designed the beautiful “The Last Supper” mosaic, which can be found in the First Independent Christ Church in Baltimore.
There is another Frederick Wilson mosaic in New Bedford, in Pilgrim Congregational Church, and a few stained glass windows by the same artist, including one in Grace Church, Episcopal.
The Glassmaker
Louis Comfort Tiffany (b. 1/17/1848–d. 2/18/1933) began his career as a painter in the 1860s and 1870s. He grew up surrounded by the decorative arts, his father having founded the most prestigious jewelry and silver store in America. Louis studied landscape painting and by 1880 established himself as an artist, becoming the youngest member of the National Academy of Design. Influenced by his travels in Europe and North Africa and his acquaintance with medieval and Roman glass, he became interested in a new challenge. He began experimenting with techniques of glassmaking at age 24. In 1885 he founded his own firm focused on art glass.
As his fascination with glass grew, he experimented with lustering techniques, patenting his first glass-lustering technique in 1881. Favrile glass, which was to become his trademark, was the result of these experiments. The word Favrile was taken from the old English word for ‘hand made’.
At his glasshouse at Corona, Long Island, Tiffany Furnaces concentrated on blown glassware. His special combination of dissolving salts of metallic oxides in the molten glass along with subjecting the glass to special heat and chemicals quickly gained Tiffany Favrile glass international acclaim for its surface iridescence and brilliant color. His vision and energy along with his blending of classical motifs with new techniques in glassmaking created a distinctive American art form and his glass is in great demand today.
Flentrop Organ
The Flentrop organ is a creation of Flentrop Orgelbouw, of Zaandam, Netherlands. The late Dirk Flentrop (d. 2003), who headed the Company, was its designer-builder. His devotion to classic Baroque design made his organs legendary among American Guild of Organists members. The organ was built according to the Baroque design common in Bach’s day. It is a “tracker” (mechanical-action) instrument, using low wind pressure. Its pipe case is free standing, shallow, with pipes unenclosed by any chambers. Thus the organ speaks directly into the sanctuary.
The organ was a result of careful planning by devoted church members and the late E. Power Biggs and the late Charles Drake. Dirk Flentrop built the organ in 1965. It was dedicated in 1967 in a concert by Donald Willing, then chair of the organ department of the New England Conservatory. It is often used for special concerts, especially AGO concerts featuring the music of Johan Sebastian Bach.
Flentrop was a gifted designer, builder and restorer. His pioneering efforts to rekindle an interest in mechanical-action organs brought new life to church music globally. His first tracker-action organ on these shores was for Busch Hall at Harvard University. The instrument was called by organ historian Jonathan Ambrosino, “the beacon of a new age.”
Flentrop’s great care in designing an organ for this church which would endure and sound well for countless years is testimony to his love of music and his care of the congregations he worked with, and this church in particular. A religious liberal himself, Dirk felt very at home here and likened the City of New Bedford to places in the Netherlands. Flentrop last visited this church in 1987. He wanted and achieved a tonal honesty, clarity and directness for this worship room. The instrument is known internationally. It is a crown jewel for the church and for the city.
Much information provided by former organist of this church, Judith C. Brownell.
“THE CARPENTER’S SON” – A Unitarian Paiting
On March 1, 2007, First Unitarian in New Bedford transferred ownership of “The Carpenter’s Son,” a wonderful late-19th C. painting by Edward Emerson Simmons, to the Rotch-Jones-Duff House and Garden Museum. This painting is on the front of this order of service.
There’s a story behind the transfer.
Miss Amelia C. Jones of New Bedford purchased the painting from the artist, and Miss Jones bequeathed the painting to First Unitarian in 1935. Tragically, a vandal broke into the church and seriously damaged the painting in 1996, cutting a large section out of it, making the rest of the painting worthless. But remarkably, the lost section of the painting was recovered in the fall of 2006.
The Women’s Alliance of First Unitarian had purchased a new refrigerator. A worker was moving the old refrigerator out of the church kitchen, when he noticed a piece of canvas had been stuffed behind it. He called over Claudette Blake, our church administrator at the time, who recognized it was the lost section of “The Carpenter’s Son.”
Claudette was interviewed by the New Bedford Standard-Times on February 27, 2007, and told them, “When I looked at it, I saw the face of the child, which I immediately recognized. I remember doing a little dance. I’m happy I was there because it might just have been thrown away.”
The congregation decided to transfer ownership of the damaged painting to the Rotch-Jones-Duff House and Garden Museum just a few blocks away from the church. By transferring ownership to a local museum, the painting will have a much wider audience. With the help of Nancy Crosby, a member of First Unitarian, the Rotch-Jones-Duff House is currently raising money to restore the painting.
The congregation retains great fondness for the painting. Edward Emerson Simmons, the artist, was the son of a Unitarian minister, and his painting presents Jesus as fully human. Simmons was born in Concord, Massachusetts, and was influenced by another Concord resident, Ralph Waldo Emerson, the great Unitarian philosopher and poet. Interestingly, Emerson preached for several months here at First Unitarian in New Bedford in 1833-1834.
