In 1811 when Stephen Hempstead, a hero of the Revolutionary War, moved to St. Louis, he found that there was not one Protestant Church in the entire area. He began corresponding with the Connecticut Missionary Society requesting that they send Bibles and "a man". It was due to his persistence that the Society finally commissioned Rev. Salmon Giddings who arrived in St. Louis in 1816. In the following 12 years of Rev. Giddings' ministry, before his death in 1828, he organized six congregations in Missouri and six in Illinois.
On October 4, 1816, Rev. Giddings organized Bonhomme Church in the log cabin home of Capt. Joseph Conway. The following Sunday, October 6, he held the first worship service and ordained the Elders, one of whom was Stephen Hempstead. Bonhomme became the second Presbyterian congregation organized west of the Mississippi River and the first in the St. Louis area (the first is in Caledonia, MO).
The first worship service and many of the early services were held in the log cabin home of "Widow" Smith. During this period, Bonhomme did not have a full-time minister, but was served by several circuit riders and Rev. Giddings, when his schedule and the weather permitted.
In 1819, a small log building was erected for use as a church and school. The building burned some time before 1829 and all records were lost.
The congregation grew slowly for the next several years and then declined for lack of a pastor. In November of 1828, the church was re-organized under the Rev. Ball with a roster of 10 members.
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In 1841, the members of the congregation decided that they should build a church building. Land was donated by Joseph Conway, Jr. and his wife, Virginia. Originally, it had been part of his father's Spanish Land Grant. $431.00 was raised for supplies and to pay a professional stone mason to lay the corners of the walls. The members did the rest of the construction work. In December of 1841, the building, now known as the Old Stone Church, was completed and dedicated. It is a three story structure. The ground floor served as a local schoolroom and living quarters for the teacher, the second floor is the sanctuary, and above that is the "slave gallery" or balcony where the slaves sat when they attended worship service. Never modernized, the Old Stone Church served the Bonhomme congregation for more than a century.
Dr. Herbert Watson came to St. Louis in 1943 as Superintendent of Home Missions for the Presbytery. By the mid-1950's he was considering the possibility of forming a new Bonhomme congregation. At that time, Bonhomme had three members all from the same family: Miss Annie Yokel, Miss Doris Andrae and Mrs. Ernest V. (Gladys) Hill. In the late 1940's, Dr. Watson began to hold worship services for this small congregation,...once a month, on Sunday afternoons,...and because the Old Stone Church didn't have central heating, only during the summer. Dr. Watson fully agreed with Dr. J. Layton Mauze, Jr. of Central Presbyterian Church in Clayton, that a new building was a necessity if Bonhomme Church was to survive and serve. |
Upon her death in 1956, Miss Annie Yokel bequethed $100,000 to Bonhomme. With these funds and generous contributions from the Central Presbyterian Church, an immediate building program was possible. In 1957, Dr. Watson, at the direction of Presbytery, came to Bonhomme as Pastor. He was a member of the group that selected the site for the new buildings on a seven acre hill-top, one-half mile west of the Old Stone Church. In July of 1959, Dr. Watson held the first worship service in the basement of the unfinished educational building. In November, the first service was held in the new chapel. By the end of 1962, the congregation had 225 active members. With his assignement at Bonhomme completed, Dr. Watson retired and Dr. Rollyn Moseson accepted a call as pastor.
By 1965, the new chapel proved to be too small for the growing membership. The congregation undertook the building of a larger sanctuary which was dedicated to the glory of God on Sunday, October 1, 1967. After 20 years of service, on July 31, 1982, Dr. Moseson retired. Under his pastorate, the membership at Bonhomme had grown to 1500.
On July 24, 1983, the congregation called Rev. James A. Capps as their Pastor. In July 1985, the congregation voted to authorize the construction of a new Education/Fellowship center and planned modifications to existing facilities. The new building was dedicated on September 4, 1987. After 10 years of service, Rev. Capps ended his pastorate at Bonhomme on January 31, 1995. Under his pastorship, membership grew to 2,278.
A pastor Nominating Committee was elected by the congregation in September 1995 and began the search for a new Pastor. On September 15, 1996 the congregation called Dr. Thomas Pfizenmaier to be Pastor of Bonhomme. He began his ministry at Bonhomme on November 25, 1996. |
