First Baptist Church

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- 499 Wacouta Street (at Ninth) -
- 1875, William Boyington -
(adapted by master builder Monroe Sheire)

The First Baptist Church links Lowertown with its earliest history. The congregation built its first chapel in 1851 on a prominence called Mount Pisgah which soon earned the nickname Baptist Hill, now Mears Park. The present church replaced a second "meeting house" on Wacouta near Eighth Street, built at the center of Saint Paul's residential area. The original 190-foot spire proved too heavy for foundations based in swampy ground, so it was removed in 1945. Norman Mears supported the church's commitment to stay in the inner city as part of his vision of a Lowertown revival, symbolized by the steeple reconstruction in 1965.