Correct!
The building was built across the street from the current Church, on
Hale Street, at approximately the location of the "Whale's Tale"
building. It was initially used
Wrong!...Try again
Ten Things you Never Knew about First
Parish Church in Beverly
Think you know a lot
about First Parish history? Take this quiz and find out! Click your answer
to see if you are right.
Question 10: Under which minister did
First Parish officially become a Unitarian Church?
Correct! New England
Churches experienced a wave of revivalism in the mid 18th
century leading ultimately to dissention as to the nature of our
traditions of worship. In Beverly, Rev. Abiel Abbot, called to
serve in 1803 preached a message of "universal salvation" which forced
the issue of worship for his parishioners and two Churches in
particular, the Baptist Church and The Dane Street (Third Parish) Church
split from First Parish over specific religious practices. By the time
of Abbot's death in 1828, both of these Churches were well established
and most of the more traditional parishioners had left the
Congregation. The decision in 1830 to call Rev. Thayer, a Unitarian
minister, was made with great deliberation of the Parish Committee.
Thayer’s bust stands at the head of our Church today.
Correct! In the Puritan
service, music was considered a frivolity and not allowed at all. Over
time, though, it was found that passages of the Bible were more easily
remembered if they were set to a beat of some kind. To this end, in the
Beverly Church, one of the duties of the Deacon was to recite one line of
verse at a time, which would be repeated by the members of the
Congregation. This quite naturally led to singing the verses and some
members of the Congregation became quite good at it. In 1764, the Church
approved a petition from members of the Congregation to designate certain
pews at the front of the Church for the use of singers, who would lead the
verses at the direction of the Deacon. From this came the Beverly Singing
School, dedicated to teaching religious singing for the Worship Service.
The School quickly expanded its activities to a general music school,
instructing not only singing, but instruments as well.
Question 9: When was music first used in
First Parish Sunday services?
Correct!
In
1800, the principal means of funding the Church was through a system of
taxes assessed on the residents based on the value of their property
(This is the reason why Churches were incorporated through acts of the
Legislature.) Therefore, every person residing in Beverly who owned
property was assessed a “head” tax to fund the Church. Individuals who
were destitute or were otherwise experiencing hard times could apply to
the Parish Clerk for an abatement of their taxes. This system continued
into the 1820s, when the law in Massachusetts was finally guarantee
separation of Church and State. In spite of this, assessments continued
to be made to residents in a tax-like system into the 1860s.
Correct!
Born
in Salem, Robert Rantoul was a pharmacist in Beverly. In October 1805,
Rantoul and two other parishioners organized a Church committee that was
charged with distributing excess Church funds amongst the poor members
of the Church. In December 1806, He recommended that a portion of this
money be used to purchase books, that they may be circulated amongst the
members for their edification, thus establishing the first library in the
town.
Question 7: Who initiated the Church's
first Social Action Committee?
Correct! First Parish has
its roots in the early Puritan movement. Even so, we are considered one of
the later Puritan Churches, established by a second generation of Puritans
some 40 years after the Salem Church was founded. Shortly after the
Witchcraft hysteria of 1692, our worshipers evolved into the more familiar
“Congregational” denomination based on the Church of England and eventually
into theUnitarian-Universalist Church we are today.
Question 6: What was the original
religious denomination of the First Parish Church?
Correct! The
congregation worships today in the third meeting house. The first,
built on Hale Street in 1656, was sold in 1682 when a second meeting
house was erected on Cabot Street. This building was taken down in 1770
and a third structure was erected in its place. During its
construction, services were held under an Oak tree on the Town Common
near Rev. Hale’s house. The current Church has undergone three
major renovations- in 1795 when it was cut in half and lengthened, in
1835 when the portico was added and in 1974 when Hale Hall was
excavated.
Correct! Deacon
Charles Davis left $5000 to the Sunday School, “The interest of which to be
given over to the Superintendent and used to celebrate the anniversaries of
the Sunday School, or for whatever purposes the Superintendent may see
necessary.”. It was immediately after this bequest that the Sunday School
anniversary tradition began, with elaborate services each October.
Question 4: What First Parishioner is
considered the major benefactor of our Sunday
School?
Correct! Rev, Joseph Willard, called to
serve in our Church in 1772, left in 1785 to become the President of Harvard
College. He was replaced by the Rev. Joseph McKeen, who resigned in 1803 to
become the first President of Bowdoin College in Maine.
Question 3: Which of our Ministers
resigned
to become the President of Harvard College?
Correct!
The legend is that the wife of Capt.
Hugh- Hill, a Beverly privateer of unusual ability during the Revolutionary
War, gave birth to Hannah on board ship in Delaware Bay. It is more likely
that she was Hannah whose death was recorded in First Parish records as
"daughter of James and Elizabeth, born on the passage from Ireland to this
country, (so says rumor but believed not to be true) of apoplexy, Mar. 16,
1838, a. 53 years”.
This James may have
been a brother of Capt. Hugh Hill, who was also an immigrant from Ireland.
Question 2: The
founders of our Sunday School, as every First Parishioner knows,
were Hannah Hill and Joanna Prince. According to tradition, where was Hannah
Hill born?
