Trinity Episcopal Cathedral (Davenport, Iowa)
History
Development of the Episcopal Church in Davenport
The Episcopal Church can trace its beginnings in Scott County to services held in 1837 by the Rt. Rev. Philander Chase, Bishop of Illinois. The services were held in the hotel at Rockingham, which is now the southwest section of Davenport. In 1841 the Rev. Zachariah Goldsmith of Virginia was appointed missionary to Davenport by the Domestic Committee of the Board of Missions of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States. On October 14, 1841, Trinity Church was organized in Davenport. The congregation originally worshiped in the home of Dr. John Emerson on Second Street. He owned the slave Dred Scott, who lived with him in Davenport. A small frame church was built on the corner of Fourth and Main Streets. In 1853 the congregation erected a stone building at the corner of Fifth and Rock Island (now Pershing) Streets. The building was built in the Gothic style and included a rose window. It is the first church in Iowa to have a pipe organ.
Diocese of Iowa
The Rt. Rev. Jackson Kemper, the missionary bishop of the Northwest, invited the clergy and representatives of the congregations of the state of Iowa to a meeting on August 17, 1853, at Trinity Church in Muscatine. In the absence of the bishop, the Rev. Alfred Louderbeck of Trinity Church in Davenport was elected the chairman. At this gathering, the constitutions and canons for the new Diocese of Iowa were adopted, and plans were made for the election of a bishop. The General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America admitted the Diocese of Iowa to its membership on October 7–8, 1853.
On May 31, 1854, the first convention of the Diocese of Iowa began at Trinity Church in Davenport. During the convention, the Rev. Henry Washington Lee, rector of St. Luke's Church in Rochester, New York, was elected bishop. He was consecrated on October 18, 1854, in his church in Rochester.
Through the generosity of people from the eastern United States, Bishop Lee purchased land as an investment for the new diocese. From the sale of this property a bishop's residence was built, and the diocese also had an endowment of $53,000. On June 29, 1859, the bishop purchased the former Iowa College property in Davenport for $36,000. The school had moved to Grinnell, Iowa and was renamed Grinnell College. Bishop Lee opened Griswold College on the site. The school was named for Bishop Alexander Viets Griswold of Massachusetts. The college closed in the late 19th century.
Grace Cathedral
When Bishop Lee arrived in Davenport, he found that several people had left Trinity Church and wanted to create a new parish. He gave his permission, and they formed St. Luke's Church. They initially worshiped in the former First Baptist Church on Brady Street between Third and Fourth Streets. The Rev. George W. Watson was named the rector. He was followed by the Rev. Horatio Powers. The congregation built a new church on the northwest corner of Brady and Seventh Streets; but because of financial difficulties, they had to sell the property to First Presbyterian Church. The building eventually became the Academy of Sciences, a forerunner of the Putnam Museum. A chapel was constructed on the corner of Main and 12th Streets on the Griswold College property where the congregation worshiped until June 18, 1873, when it became the nucleus for the new Bishop's Church.
Bishop's Churches, or cathedrals, were not commonplace in the Episcopal Church of the United States at the time. The Cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul in Chicago was the first Episcopal cathedral in the country. It had not been built as a cathedral, however. The diocese acquired the Church of the Atonement in 1861, which was deep in debt and about to default, and it was renamed. The Cathedral of Our Merciful Saviour in Faribault, Minnesota, which had been consecrated in 1869 by Bishop Kemper, was the first church built as a cathedral.
Bishop Lee began planning for the Bishop's Church after he received a gift of $30,000 from David J. Ely of Chicago in memory of his daughter, Sarah Ely Parsons, for the expressed purpose of building a cathedral. Edward Tuckerman Potter of New York City was chosen as the architect. He was the son of the Rt. Rev. Alonzo Potter who had been the Bishop of Pennsylvania, and one of his brothers, Henry C. Potter, was a priest and later bishop in New York. The cathedral was designed in the English Gothic style. The cornerstone for the new cathedral was laid on June 17, 1867, on the Griswold College property. The building was completed in 1873 according to 14 architectural drawings, but without the planned bell tower and spire.
The Diocesan Convention of 1872 recommended that the structure should be a cathedral church. It was named Grace Cathedral after Grace Church in New York because a significant amount of the money that was raised to build the cathedral came from this one parish. David J. Wolfe and his daughter Catherine Lorillard Wolfe from another New York parish were also major contributors. The church was built for $80,000, of which 10% of the money was contributed from people in Iowa. The financial panics of the 1870s affected donations for the building project. Bishop Lee contributed nearly $15,000 of his own money to finish construction and furnish the church. The cathedral was consecrated on June 18, 1873, by Bishop Lee. He was joined by Bishops Robert Clarkson of Nebraska and Henry Benjamin Whipple of Minnesota, who preached the dedicatory sermon.
Grace Cathedral was initially a Bishop's Church and not a parish church, although Bishop Lee had hoped that it would be so, possibly uniting with Trinity Church. The bishop was nominally in charge, and he had an Assistant in Charge to oversee the day-to-day workings of the cathedral. The following clergy fulfilled that roll: Rev. Horatio N. Powers, 1865-1869; Rev. Hale Townsend, 1865-1872; Rev. R. D. Brooke, 1869-1873; Rev. Edward Lounsbery, 1870-1874; Rev. Joseph S. Jenckes, 1875-1877. The Rt. Rev. William Stevens Perry, Lee's successor as Bishop of Iowa, implemented the cathedral organization on April 1, 1877. Bishop Perry appointed a dean and chapter based on the English model. The chapter was made up of the following officials: praecentor, chancellor, treasurer, canons, rural deans, and honorary prebends. Not all of these offices were functional, not all of them were filled all the time, and the dean actually functioned as a parish vicar. The Very Rev. Dr. Willis H. Barris was appointed as the cathedral's first dean, and the Rev. Joseph S. Jenches, Jr., was appointed the first canon. The Rev. Charles R. Hale replaced Dean Barris in 1886. Hale was elected Assistant-Bishop of Springfield, Illinois, and he was succeeded by the Rev. Hamilton Schuyler in 1896.
The Rt. Rev. Theodore Nevin Morrison was consecrated as the third bishop of Iowa on February 22, 1899. The cathedral organization was allowed to lapse that same year, and in September the congregation was organized as Grace Cathedral parish. The Rev. Nassau S. Stephens was called as rector, and he took charge on October 1, 1899. He was replaced by the Rev. W. W. Love in 1905, and the Rev. Dr. Marmaduke Hare replaced him three years later. Hare was conferred with the honorary title of Dean by Bishop Morrison.
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