This Year’s Award Recipients
At its annual meeting in Concord, NH on May 11, 2006, the Congregational Christian Historical Society voted the following awards for excellence in local church history and anniversary programming:
The award falls into two categories, for churches with a membership over 350 members and those under 350. This year we have four wonderful recipients.
1st Place - over 350
The winner is Second Congregational Church of Greenwich, CT., celebrating its 300 th year in 2005. The author is Ralph Ahlberg, a retired UCC pastor and trustee of Hartford Seminary. This is, put simply, a beautiful book, lovingly illustrated and crisply written. It interweaves the story of Congregationalism in Greenwich with larger currents in American society and culture. We are enormously pleased to honor this contribution.
1st Place - under 350
The second category has two winners and one honorable mention.
The first winner goes to Washington Congregational Church in Washington, NH, and North Brookfield Congregational Church in North Brookfield, MA. The authors of the first, Ronald and Grace Jager, have produced a beautiful volume which not only tells the 225 year history of their church, but sheds light on the nature of New England Congregationalism and the settlement of New Hampshire in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It's a pleasure to include this book in the Congregational Library alongside other books the Jagers have already produced on the history of Washington, NH, and of The Granite State itself.
The second winner in this category is the North Brookfield Congregational Church, celebrating its 250 th anniversary. The author of the volume is Jeffrey H. Fiske. This is another beautifully produced volume which even includes an entire chapter on temperance reform (including a two page illustration of "The Drunkard's Progress") and one on abolition. It is certainly a pleasure to see a congregation with such a grasp of its own colorful history—congratulations to you!
The awards committee also decided to give an honorable mention to the First United Church of Christ Congregational in Comfrey, Minnesota. This is a multi-author work—but none of them are here today to accept their award, unfortunately. This church is celebrating its centennial year, as the first Protestant church of any kind established in Comfrey, with a group of twelve settlers. This is a town that was devastated by a tornado in March 1998; the church building survived, with some damage, and became the local retail store for the entire town as gifts flowed in from the Salvation Army and other benefactors. Obviously, they have stories to tell, and they have done so with enthusiasm and fun in their anniversary volume.