Author Unknown. Believed to be written in 1966(?)

St. Mary's is the product of a vision of the future formed by the Rev. Dr. Samuel Farmar Jarvis, who, with the blessing of Bishop Hobart, held services in the Francis Finlay Academy, located about where the l25th Street station of the West Side Subway is located. Services were conducted by Thomas I. Croshon, then a lay reader, until 1823 when the Rev. William Richmond, rector of St. Michael's Church (presently located at 99th Street and Amsterdam Avenue) was elected rector.

In 1824 Jacob Schieffelin donated about 2 1/2 lots of land on Lawrence Street (now l26th Street) for the erection of St. Mary's Church. The frame building stood until 1908 when the present brick church was built on the same site.

St. Mary's established the first free school in the City in 1823, open to all denominations. The founding of the school was only one of the many services St. Mary's has performed in its 146 years of existence. During the cholera epidemic of 1832, the rector was placed in charge of the whole upper part of Manhattan and had authority to purchase, at public expense, whatever medi­cal supplies, food and clothing might be needed for the suffering and famine stricken.

Following the panic of 1857, St. Mary's rector, the Rev. Dr. Thomas Peters, was placed in charge of relief for the upper West Side of the City. He started a public works project of the first street paving in the neighborhood.

The work of St. Mary's, aided by the Diocese of New York, in con­nection with a changing neighborhood is typical of the work our Lord intended that his Church would do among men.

 During its 146 year history, St. Mary's has been served by 13 rectors. Aside from the work of the Rev. Dr. Jarvis, the follow­ing clergy served as rectors of St. Mary's:
 

The Rev. Thomas Croshon
The Rev. William Richmond
The Rev. James Cook Richmond
The Rev. Thomas McClure Peters
The Rev. Charles F. Rodenstein
The Rev. George F. Seymour
The Rev. Charles Coffin Adams, D.D.
The Rev. Lawrence Schwabb, D.D.
The Rev. Hiram Richard Hulse
The Rev. John Loftus Scully
The Rev. Francis Brown
The Rev. Frederick W. Goodman
The Rev. Charles Breck Ackley,S.T.D.

Because of the work thrust upon St. Mary's in terms of the problems brought about through changes in neighborhood, its own funds were insufficient for its program, and it became an aided parish. In 1956 the Rev. Richard E. Gary was named priest-in-charge.

The Diocese presently [as of 1966] supports St. Mary's programs in amounts of more than $30,000 each year. This is in addition to funds forth­coming from other sources. Much of this money goes for support and operation of the Ackley Center and its important outreach to the youth of the area.

Considerable and important aid is given to the Center's programs by interested, skilled people from such institutions as Union Theological Seminary.

We who call ourselves the congregation of St. Mary's Church are using and enjoying the inheritance left to us out of the labors and devotion of those who walked before us in the Faith.