SUNY grad students help preserve historic church

The Daily Star, Oneonta, N.Y.
·2 min read

Sep. 30—Work done by students in SUNY Oneonta's Cooperstown Graduate Program has helped Hartwick Seminary's Evangelical Lutheran Church to be placed on the New York State Register of Historic Places and nominated to the National Register of Historic Places.

The church is on state Route 28, five miles southwest of Cooperstown, bordered to the east by the Cooperstown Dreams Park. Built in 1839, it is of the Greek Revival style and, according to Dr. Cynthia Falk, professor at the graduate program, worth preserving because of its social and architectural history.

"The Evangelical Church has been an important component to the landscape in the community that grew up around Hartwick Seminary for over 180 years," Falk said in a media release from the college. "The changes and additions that occurred to the building over time have been sensitive to its past."

Falk said that despite the recreational fields that surround the structure, the church "retains its overall historical integrity." It remains as the key feature of the once prominent Hartwick Seminary, the namesake of the area, which evolved to become Hartwick College in Oneonta, the release said.

According to the release, Falk and her students were contacted by a member of the church's congregation to discover whether the church could be added to the National Register of Historic Places. She and three students — Emma Dambek, Nick DelDuca, and Anna Minnebo — conducted research during the spring 2021 semester. They studied the history of the church and Hartwick Seminary using old newspapers, interviews, published histories and archival materials. They visited the site, took photographs, and provided details that were included in a lengthy application to make the church's case for the National Register of Historic Places.

"Service-learning projects such as this benefit both the community and the students," Falk said. "The community will be able to enjoy the historic church for years to come, and the students gain hands-on experience that they can directly apply after graduation." Minnebo accepted a position as the preservation planner for the city of Holland, Michigan.

The church "desired this listing both to recognize its history but also to qualify for grant funding from the New York Landmarks Conservancy Sacred Sites program," the release said.

The outskirts of Cooperstown have evolved, "developing to serve new roles for the community," the release said. "These changes have emanated outwards and can be seen around the church," Falk said. "Despite all the development this stretch of NY-28 has seen, the setting of the Evangelical Lutheran Church with the hills beyond the Susquehanna River rising in the distance remains."