Macalester College - Quid Nunc Yearbook (St Paul, MN)

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of Hope Church. This was a dignified little frame chapel with tall, narrow windows and an unassuming entrance, quite different from the impressive brick church in the heart of the city. But it brought religion closer to the people living on the outskirts of the new city, and for years it served as a place of worship. Strangely enough, it survived the First Pres- byterian Church, which was torn down to make way for a row of store-buildings. The Hrst House of Hope is still standing, its walls a weatherbeaten gray, its narrow windows con- verted into doors which open upon four small flats. Tucked away in a side street where few notice it, it is a quiet reminder of a man who spent his life building in the service of others. So actively was Dr. Neill interested in the struggling little congregation of the House of Hope that he decided to give up his fine brick house on Fourth street and move out l D 0 9 9 0 M'r-f'ei'ff55i'ff5Ci'17'56 into the district where his duties called him each Sunday. Presently a frame house began to go up on the hill above the House of Hope chapelg there was a road along the summit of the hill, a road which, years later, was flanked by huge residences and Wide lawns. But in those days there was only the one lonely house, the first ever built on Summit Avenue, set in a grove of trees where the James J. Hill man- sion stands today. At the rear of the house a long flight of stairs led down to the modest little building at the foot of the hill. It was here that Dr. Neill spent one of the most useful portions of his life, devoting himself to the service of a town which was to become a city and a Territory which was to become a state. 6 15 113: -q u N, ,,

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,,,-...jnm . .- .. .F ,..q L 9 , - 1 Qf-ff!! I 5: ,f -L.-if f L. 'flT 7 N -1 li not a prospect that in a half-century the In- dian lodges that now surround us will be far removed, that the steam-engine will move from Montreal to the Rapids of St. Mary, and stop at the roaring waters of St. Anthony, that the gates of the Rocky Mountains will be thrown open, and the locomotive, groaning and rumbling from Oregon, will stop here with its heavy train of Asiatic produceg that the mission stations of Remnica and Lac Qui Parle will be supplanted by the white school- house, the church-spire, and the higher semi- nary of learning? Do we not '. . . hear the tread of pioneers Of nations yet to be, The first low Wash of waves Where soon Shall roll a human sea? ' On the fourth of March, 1854, an act of the Legislature was approved incorporating the City of St. Paul, and one month later the Hrst election for city oflicers was held. St. Paul had entered upon a new era. The little village was beginning to assume the proportion of a city as Well as the title. Hotels and 'Ibid. boarding-houses were crowded and frequently people camped in the streets. Carpenters and mechanics could not half keep up with their work, all business houses made large profits, a great deal of building was done, and Third, Fourth, and jackson streets were graded, and other prominent streets Were improved . . . In the fall the Presbyterian society known as the House of Hope was organized by Rev. E. D. Neill. :f THE FIRST House OF HOPE When the congregation of the First Presby- terian Church had increased to such an extent that forty pews were added to the church, and the members were financially able to support a minister, Dr. Neill, feeling the urge for new frontiers, resigned as pastor of the First Pres- byterian Church and became minister-at-large to the entire city. Soon, however, he began the policy of preaching every Sunday in the upper part of St. Paul, where there were no churches. This led to the building some years later, on Walnut street near Oak, of the House

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