UUSS HISTORY PART ONE — The First Half Century (1868–1915)

Inside UUSS History

Origins of the First Unitarian Church in Sacramento, 1864-1868

The enthusiastic reception given to Rev. King demonstrated that the town was now fertile ground for Unitarian ideas. Indeed, the town of Sacramento had been founded nineteen years before the First Unitarian Church was organized through the direct efforts of the American Unitarian Association (AUA) headquartered in Boston. Its days as a rough frontier town were but a fading memory.

In late April of 1864, Rev. Henry Whitney Bellows of All Souls Church in New York City arrived in San Francisco because of the untimely death of his good friend Rev. T. Starr King, minister of the San Francisco First Unitarian Church. After selecting Horatio Stebbins to replace King, Bellows returned to his New York church determined to bring encouragement to Unitarian families scattered in towns arising around the Bay area.

“There are seventeen Unitarian families in Sacramento” he told a church convention in a plea for support of “missionary” help for the westward expanding portion of the nation. Largely through Bellows‘ determination, a fund of $100,000 was raised for that purpose in 1865.

As a result, Rev. Charles Gordon Ames became the missionary to the Pacific Coast area. Based in San Francisco as assistant minister of the church there and his salary paid by the Association in Boston, at age thirty-four he then had the stamina to explore adjacent towns in search of Unitarians and other religious liberals. By 1867 he was lecturing and preaching in public halls from Monterey to Sacramento. His transportation was by horse and buggy; often he stopped where nightfall found him to sleep under the open sky. By December of that year Ames‘ work had resulted in regular meetings of Sacramento Unitarians.

The Sacramento Bee carried this story in its issue of Saturday, December 21, 1867:

UNITARIAN — Rev. Henry W. Brown, said to be a most eloquent divine who has just arrived from the East, will preach his maiden sermon in California at the Metropolitan Theater in this city tomorrow evening. He is said to be the most fascinating preacher on this coast.

According to an undocumented account, the Rev. Mr. Brown was an educator and a graduate of Harvard Divinity School, who came here in connection with the public schools. There were regular newspaper notices of weekly services by him in the Metropolitan Theater on K Street between 4th and 5th. The formal inauguration of the church has been dated as Sunday, March 29, 1868. On Saturday the Bee had announced:

UNITARIAN — There will be Unitarian services at the District Courtroom, corner of I and Sixth Streets, at 10 3/4 a.m., and 7 1/2 p.m. tomorrow. Preaching by Rev. H. W. Brown. All are cordially invited.

This date marks the occasion of the formal founding of the church. An Article of Agreement was drawn up, stating simply: “We, the undersigned, do hereby associate ourselves in a body corporate, to be known as the First Unitarian Church of Sacramento, for the worship of God and the service of men.”

The only condition of membership was the signing of the Article of Agreement. In a short time almost a hundred persons signed the document. The by-laws provided that three of the seven trustees might be women. No doubt that was very progressive for that era, even if it did guarantee minority status for women. Accordingly Mrs. C. W. Davenport, Mrs. Rosa F. Foote and Mrs. Georgiana Griffiths were elected. The male trustees were Dr. Henry L. Nichols, Dr. Alexander B. Nixon, Henry Starr, and Thomas Ross.


Dr. Alexander Nixon

Dr. Henry Nichols, M.D., was born in Augusta, Maine in 1823. After postgraduate studies at the Philadephia Medical School, he practiced medicine in Maine until 1853 when, encouraged by an uncle to head west, he arrived in Sacramento by way of the Isthmus of Panama. In addition to practicing medicine in Sacramento, he served as the president of the city Board of Supervisors and as the California Secretary of State. He remained a member and strong advocate of the Unitarian Church of Sacramento for forty-seven years.

Alexander B. Nixon, M.D., was born in Ohio in 1821, educated at Miami University (Ohio) and graduated from Ohio Medical College in 1849. He came to Sacramento with the Gold Rush in 1849, became a state senator, headed medical societies and became chief of the Central Pacific Railroad Hospital in Sacramento.

Henry Starr was born In Nova Scotia, Canada, in 1819. He came to Sacramento in 1852 by way of Maine Wesleyan Seminary and became an attorney by “reading law” in Illinois. He was elected to the state legislature and later served as District Attorney in Sacramento, holding high military rank.

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