Our History
Carondelet Presbyterian Church was the earliest Protestant Church in Carondelet. Its first meetings were held in a vacant room in the home of General Madison Miller at the foot of Bowen Street in 1849. Later the group met in a log cabin just north of the Bowen Street house. The present church site at 6116 Michigan Avenue was donated by August A. Blumenthal, a building was erected, and the church was organized on June 2, 1850 by Rev. Robert S. Finley.
Construction began on a new church on the present site in 1859, after razing of the older building. Work was delayed by the Civil War and services were held in the City Hall and the Old Fellows Hall until the basement of the new structure was completed in 1863. The 1863 brick building is one of only a few Civil War era churches remaining in the city.
The present stone church was built next to the older structure in 1896 and later an educational unit was erected. In 1958, the church's name became Carondelet-Markham Memorial Presbyterian Church, following a merger with Markham Church, previously at 1614 Menard Street.
