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Box Pews, Looking Down
Rocky Hill Meetinghouse
Amesbury, Massachusetts
Selenium toned silver gelatin print from 4x5 negative
Negative Date:
2004
From the series:
The Colonial Meetinghouses of New
England.
The Puritans were
religious dissidents from England who were a byproduct of the protestant
reformation. They believed that the reformation of the Church of England
did not go far enough in separating the Anglican Church from Catholicism,
and worked unsuccessfully to purify the church from the elaborate rituals
which they saw as a distraction to the true worship of God. Beginning in
1630, they were forced to move to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, where they
established a society based on their simple beliefs. The Rocky Hill
Meetinghouse, built in 1785, is one of the last of the meetinghouses built
with tax money and used for both religious worship and town business.
These were municipal structures which were devoid of religious adornment,
and did not even have a cross on the wall. Families sat in box pews, and
this photograph, looking straight down, offers a different perspective.
This photograph is included in the book
A Space for Faith: The Colonial
Meetinghouses of New England (www.aspaceforfaith.com).
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