The First Unitarian Church of

Omaha, Nebraska Omaha ( ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Nebraska and the county seat of Douglas County. Omaha is in the Midwestern United States on the Missouri River, about north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's 39th-largest cit ...

is a

Unitarian Universalist Church Unitarian or Unitarianism may refer to: Christian and Christian-derived theologies A Unitarian is a follower of, or a member of an organisation that follows, any of several theologies referred to as Unitarianism: * Unitarianism (1565–present) ...

located at 3114 Harney Street in the Midtown area.

History

First Unitarian Church of Omaha was incorporated on August 22, 1869, by twenty-six men and women. Its regular minister was Reverend Henry E. Bond, and its first chapel was a small brick building located at 17th and Cass that was dedicated in 1871. In the fall of 1889 Reverend Newton M. Mann came to serve the church. Mann was the first American minister to promote

evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

. The present

Colonial Revival The Colonial Revival architectural style seeks to revive elements of American colonial architecture. The beginnings of the Colonial Revival style are often attributed to the Centennial Exhibition of 1876, which reawakened Americans to the archi ...

building at 31st and Harney was designed by Omaha architects John McDonald and his son Alan McDonald. Former U.S. president

William Howard Taft William Howard Taft (September 15, 1857March 8, 1930) was the 27th president of the United States (1909–1913) and the tenth chief justice of the United States (1921–1930), the only person to have held both offices. Taft was elected pr ...

, who was then president of the Unitarian Church Conference in the United States and Canada, presided at the 1917 cornerstone-laying ceremony. The building was dedicated in September 1918. In the 1930s, Sarah Joslyn gave the church its

Aeolian-Skinner Æolian-Skinner Organ Company, Inc. of Boston, Massachusetts was an American builder of a large number of pipe organs from its inception as the Skinner Organ Company in 1901 until its closure in 1972. Key figures were Ernest M. Skinner (1866– ...

pipe organ.

References

First Unitarian Church of Omaha website.
Retrieved 2011-10-27. Kidd, Daniel. Retrieved 2011-10-25.

External links

* National Register of Historic Places in Omaha, Nebraska Churches in Omaha, Nebraska 19th-century Unitarian Universalist church buildings Unitarian Universalist churches in Nebraska Churches on the National Register of Historic Places in Nebraska {{Nebraska-church-stub