First Congregational Church (Atlanta)

First Congregational Church
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Atlanta Landmark Building
First Congregational Church (2012)
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Location	105 Courtland St., NE, Atlanta, Georgia
Coordinates	33°45′27″N 84°23′1″W / 33.75750°N 84.38361°W / 33.75750; -84.38361
Area	less than one acre
Built	1908 (1908)
Built by	Robert E. Pharrow
Architect	Alexander Campbell Bruce, Arthur Greene Everett
Architectural style	Renaissance
NRHP reference No.	79000720[1]
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	January 19, 1979
Designated ALB	October 23, 1989

First Congregational Church (First Church; United Church of Christ) is a United Church of Christ church located in downtown Atlanta at the corner of Courtland Street and John Wesley Dobbs Avenue (formerly Houston Street).The church has had many prominent members over the years including Alonzo Herndon and Andrew Young. First Congregational Church welcomes people from all racial and economic backgrounds and has a prominent music ministry. The current senior minister, Dr. Reverend Dwight Andrews, is also a professor of music at Emory University.

The church is the second-oldest African-American Congregational Church in the United States. The American Missionary Association (AMA) established the Storrs School in Atlanta. The school served as a center for social services, education, and worship for newly freed blacks. Worshipers at the school's services petitioned for a church of their own. As a result, in May 1867 a Congregational Church was organized,^[2] and the AMA donated the land. The church's first service was held on May 26, 1867, and its first ten members included Reverend and Mrs. Frederick Ayer and Atlanta University's first president Edmund Asa Ware.^[3]: 209

The church was never formally segregated but had become mostly black by 1892. The current building is the second church, built on the site of the original one in 1908.^[4]