St. Michael’s Lectures in Marblehead

St. Michael’s Episcopal Church in Marblehead has announced the first three lectures in its
Tercentenary Celebration.

On Wednesday, 26 February, Judy Anderson will speak about “Marblehead: 1714”, the year that church was erected. Her illustrated talk will discuss community and social life of the period, including how Marblehead residents dressed and furnished their houses. She’ll describe the many domestic and public buildings built in the seaport town in the early 1700s. Formerly curator of Marblehead’s Jeremiah Lee Mansion, Judy is author of Glorious Splendor: The 18th-Century Wallpapers in the Jeremiah Lee Mansion.

Robert Booth’s Tuesday, 11 March, lecture is titled “Who Filled the Pews in St. Michael’s Church: 1714-1750?” Booth, author of Death of an Empire: The Rise and Murderous Fall of Salem, America’s Richest City, will discuss the Anglicans in a town with a Congregationalist majority. Who chose to belong to Marblehead’s poorest and smallest congregation? Why did they do so, and what was their place in a community evolving from a depressed fishing town to a wealthy seaport?

On Wednesday, 30 April, architect Edward O. Nilsson will discuss “The Architecture of St. Michael’s: English and Dutch Antecedents.” Nilsson’s visual essay will explore possible 17th-century English and Dutch antecedents of the church, which is unique in American ecclesiastical architecture. The presentation will also look at 19th-century modifications to the building fabric that renewed the worship environment to the liturgical practices of the day.

More events are coming up.