OUR HISTORY
On Christmas Day in 1853, a small group of Williams College students met in a private home on North Street for a service from the Book of Common prayer, led by a Williams first-year student, William Tatlock. Though Anglican circuit-riding preachers must have visited the town in the 18th century, this was the first known celebration of an Episcopal service in Williamstown, Massachusetts.
Through a collaboration of funds, resources, and labor the stone church building was completed in 1894 by master stonemason Augustine Powers. St. John’s Church was organized as a parish later that year on October 24, with The Rev. Theodore Sedgwick as the founding rector. Bishop William Lawrence wrote that year of his first visitation as bishop:
“…the mission chapel was so crowded with people that during the second lesson the whole structure dropped an inch or two to the fright of the congregation.”
— Bishop William Lawrence, Oct. 24, 1894