First Congregational Church of Otis - Otis, MA
Posted by: 
neoc1
N 42° 11.684 W 073° 05.536
18T E 657514 N 4673159
First Congregational Church of Otis is located on the northeast side of the town common at 46 North Main Road in Otis, MA.
Waymark Code: WM13DFT
Location: Massachusetts, United States
Date Posted: 11/15/2020
Views: 0
The First Congregational Church of Otis was organized in 1799. Construction of a church building in Otis began when on June 5, 1810, members of the Loudon Church and the Bethlehem Church met to unite the two churches. On June 15, 1810, they presented to the General Court in Boston a petition to form a new, united congregational church. The settlement where the church was located was to named Otis after Harrison Gray Otis the president of the Massachusetts Senate.
In March 1810, a building committee decided that a new church was to be designed after an existing church in Winsted, CT that was designed by the noted Boston architect Charles Bulfinch.
The large, white clapboard covered, 2½ story structure has a protruding triple entrance and a gable roof. The middle entrance has a triangular pediment. Above this entrance is a pair of Palladian windows and an open belfry with an octagonal roof topped with a weathervane that is supported by eight circular columns. The main church is six bays wide. On the south side lower level has five double hung windows with a side entrance at the fifth bay. The upper level has six matching windows. The north side has two rows of each with six windows. A small one story high addition is attached to the back of the church.
A bronze plaque to the right of the central door is inscribed:
FIRST
CONGREGATIONAL
CHURCH
CHURCH ORGANIZED 1779
BUILDING DEDICATED 1815