Our History

The Kenwood United Church of Christ came into being on November 17, 1885 under the name of Kenwood Evangelical Church. A small faithful group of people from various denominations came together to organize The Lakeside Sunday School. At the time, Kenwood was a relatively sparsely-settled suburban community in the Township of Hyde Park, connected to Chicago by the Illinois Central Railroad. The new Sunday school was conceived as a nondenominational institution that would serve the entire community regardless of the denominational affiliations of members.

They broke ground for their first meeting house on April 9, 1885 at the intersection of Woodlawn and Lake Avenue, near Forty-fifth street. At the time of the church’s founding, the Kenwood community, bounded by Lake Michigan, 43rd St., Cottage Grove Ave., and 51st St. (now Hyde Park Blvd.), had developed an enviable reputation as a premier upper-income suburban enclave of large single-family houses set on generous, lushly-landscaped lots. In his 1874 book, Chicago and Its Suburbs, author Everett Chamberlin called Kenwood “the Lake Forest of the south,” comparing it to the exclusive North Shore suburb. This early history as a well-to-do residential community began with an early resident, Dr. John Kennicott, who established a substantial country estate called “Kenwood” in the area in 1856 soon after the construction of the Illinois Central Railroad made this rural lakefront readily accessible to the city of Chicago to the north. The Illinois Central’s 47th St. station, a short distance from Kennicott’s house, was also named “Kenwood,” and this soon became the name for the surrounding new community in general, and the new church in particular.

Membership increased rapidly, so a large wing was added and named the Kenwood Chapel. As membership continued to grow, Kenwood Sunday School was organized on August 30, 1885, along with a Ladies Society and a weekly prayer meeting. Preaching services were held from its inception, and were attended by an increasing number of people. The neighborhood was ripe for a church, thus on September 5, 1885, the decision was made to organize a neighborhood church, and on November 17, 1885, the Kenwood Evangelical Church was born with thirty-seven members.

The new Kenwood Evangelical Church was conceived as a “community church”—a nondenominational church that was meant to serve the entire Kenwood community and draw members from a variety of denominations. In the case of Kenwood Evangelical, the founders explicitly focused their efforts on evangelical Protestant denominations. Historically, “community churches” had long been in existence in the United States, primarily in rural areas and towns too small to financially sustain individual denominations. By the late nineteenth century, however, such nondenominational churches were forming in major cities where there was a burgeoning interest in ecumenism and interfaith cooperation. By the 1920s, the establishment of community churches had become common enough throughout the country that historians consider them an important component of the twentieth-century ecumenical movement. In Chicago, other community churches that were formed in the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries besides Kenwood Evangelical Church include Metropolitan Community Church (the predecessor to today’s Metropolitan Apostolic Community Church) in the Bronzeville neighborhood and Bethany Union Church in the Beverly community.

In April 1886, the Rev. John P. Hale was called as the first pastor. Rev. Hale served until 1898. As the membership continued to increase, it became clear that a larger building would be needed.

The new Kenwood Evangelical Church grew quickly, drawing its membership from the community’s many prosperous residents, and it soon outgrew its modest chapel. Within two years of its founding, the congregation decided to build a larger, more visually-impressive church building, and architects William W. Boyington and Henry B. Wheelock were hired to design it. The building’s cornerstone was laid on November 26, 1887, and construction continued into late 1888, with a building dedication held on November 18, 1888. The building (including furnishings) cost more than $64,000.

Within a decade of its completion, the Kenwood Evangelical Church had several hundred members and was an important religious institution in the Kenwood neighborhood. Many prominent Chicagoans belonged to the church, including John G. Shedd, president of the Marshall Field & Co.department store and the benefactor of the Shedd Aquarium. Others included Ernest John Magerstadt, a coal merchant and Cook County politician who commissioned architect George Maher to design a Prairie-style house three blocks south of the church at 4930 S. Greenwood Ave.; prominent meat packer Thomas Wilson; and lawyer Charles Hitchcock, who was president of the State Constitutional Convention of 1870 and Cook County Commissioner from 1872 to 1876.

Not all noteworthy church members were wealthy, however. Famed Illinois poet Edgar Lee Masters lived in the Kenwood neighborhood and attended the church while writing Spoon River Anthology, considered his masterwork. Several architects of note also attended the church, including Lewis W. Riddle and William Fellows, a partner with George Nimmons in the design of the Sears Roebuck and Co. complex in Chicago’s North Lawndale community.

By the 1920s, the northern half of the Kenwood community area—north of 47th Street and including the Kenwood United Church of Christ—was beginning to undergo economic and social changes that would greatly affect the church. The construction of a Kenwood branch of Chicago’s elevated railway system in 1907, with a terminus at 42nd Pl. and Oakenwald Ave., encouraged the redevelopment of north Kenwood with apartment buildings replacing earlier single-family houses, and many of the neighborhood’s more prosperous families left, including many Kenwood Evangelical Church members. By the 1930s, African-Americans were moving into north Kenwood, a demographic trend that quickened after World War II as the area became a lower-income, largely African-American neighborhood.

The Kenwood Evangelical Church formally disbanded in 1954. However, the congregation deeded the church building to a sister congregation, the Kenwood-Ellis Community Church, which had been sharing the building with Kenwood Evangelical for several years. Led by Rev. George Nishimoto, Kenwood-Ellis had been founded in 1948 to serve Japanese-Americans that lived in the neighborhood as a result of World War II-era relocations. Kenwood-Ellis was a mission of the Evangelical and Reformed Church. This denomination joined with the Congregational Christian Church in 1957 to form the United Church of Christ, and the Chicago church subsequently became the Kenwood United Church of Christ.

Nearly a decade later Kenwood would host Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Nearly a thousand gathered on February 3, 1966 to hear Dr. King, Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr., Mr. Al Roby, and others to argue for a Unity Plan, which would bring students from across neighborhoods, around 6,000, to a new campus of four buildings at 62nd Street and Stony Island.

Kenwood has been served by several wonderful pastors over the years:

Rev. John P. Hale (April 1886 -1898)
Rev. R. Crosser (December 1898 - June 1910)
Rev. Albert Joseph McCarney (April 9, 1911 - May 8, 1927)
Rev. Alfred Lee Wilson (March 18, 1928 - 1949)
Rev. William Charles Malloy, Jr. (April 5, 1949 - Late 1949)
Rev. George Nishimoto (1949 - February 28, 1961)
Rev. Dr. Samuel Gandy (September 1961 - December 1964)
Rev. Herbert Eaton (1964 - 1966)
Rev. Dr. Clynde Miller, Interim (1968 - 1969)
Rev. Marion Phillip (1969 - 1970)
Rev. Byron Hood (1970 - 1972)
Rev. Thomas Davis (October 27, 1974 - 1976)
Rev. Alexander Yuille (July 1977 - December 1979)
Rev. Barron Brandon, Interim (March 1980 - May 1980)
Rev. John McFarland (June 1980 - August 1980)

In August 1980, Rev. Dr. Leroy Sanders was called as Senior Pastor. Under Rev. Sanders’ leadership the church grew both numerically and spiritually. During his tenure several ministries were born including our Feed the People soup kitchen and the Norma Jean Sanders Free Clinic named after Rev. Sanders’ late wife. The Kenwood United Church of Christ was rated “orange” in the Chicago Historic Resources Survey. It was individually listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991 and is a contributing building in the North Kenwood Chicago Landmark District obtaining Chicago Landmark Designation in 2011. Rev. Sanders retired in 2015 after 36 years of service. He was succeeded by Rev. Damon Jones who served from October 2015 – March 2016.

In June 2017, the church voted to call the Rev. Lisa Goods as the first woman to serve as Senior Pastor in the church’s 132-year history. Rev. Goods was officially installed on October 15, 2017 by the Chicago Metropolitan Association of the Illinois Conference United Church of Christ surrounded by hundreds of friends, family members, colleagues and church members. Under her leadership Kenwood continued as a beacon of hope and support to all who engaged our church and community outreach entities.

The mission and ministry of Kenwood United Church of Christ continues under the pastoral servant leadership of Rev. Jamar A. Boyd, II called to serve as Senior Pastor in November 2022. Rev. Boyd was officially installed on Saturday, July 26, 2025.