St. Paul's Chapel

St. Paul's Chapel is Manhattan's oldest surviving church building, finished in seventeen sixty-six. Constructed of Manhattan mica-schist with brownstone quoins, it originally served as a chapel-of-ease for congregants who found the walk to Trinity Church too far. When a fire tore through the city in seventeen seventy-six, a bucket brigade saved the chapel while the nearby mother church burned. George Washington sat in a pew here on his inauguration day in seventeen eighty-nine, and he continued to attend services at the chapel until Trinity Church was rebuilt the following year.