Description of Historic Place

The Messiah Church is located at 35 Wellington Street, on the southeast corner of Wellington Street and Queen Street, in the City of Brantford. The two storey, buff brick church was constructed in 1869.

The property was designated, by the City of Stratford in1979, for its cultural heritage value, under Part IV of the Ontario Heritage Act, By-law 4-79.

Heritage Value

The Messiah Church is associated with several religious denominations in the City of Brantford. Messiah Church was a Christian Adventist Church in 1869. The establishment of this Adventist Church, when Brantford was smaller and much more isolated, shows the degree and influence of the world-wide Messianic expansion in the middle of the 19th century.

Congregationalists purchased the church from the Adventists in 1876 and renamed it Emmanuel Congregational Church. Subsequently, a Methodist Episcopal denomination worshipped in the building from 1878 when that group bought it from the Congregationalists.

In 1884, all Methodist churches in Canada were united into the Methodist Church of Canada. With two Methodist churches on the south side of Wellington Street in the same block (Emmanuel Methodist Episcopal and Wellington Street Wesleyan Methodist), Emmanuel Church (the former Messiah Church) was sold for secular purposes.

Benevolent social agencies which have occupied the building include the Women's Christian Temperance Union (when the building was called Willard Hall), the Social Service League of Brantford and the Family Service Bureau of Brantford and Brant County.

The Messiah Church is a good example of a late 19th century meeting hall. Typical of this style is the large rectangular shape with gable ends and minimalist detailing. The building is a symmetrical three-bays wide by four-bays deep with pilasters marking the divisions. Window sashes are two over four with segmented heads and wooden shutters. Two stone markers adorn the Messiah church building, a date stone, and one bearing the words “Occupy Till I Come”.

Source: City of Brantford, By-law 4-79.

Character-Defining Elements

Character defining elements that contribute to the heritage value of Messiah Church include its:
- two storey, buff brick exterior
- hip roof
- symmetrical three-bays by four-bays divided by brick pilasters
- radiating brick voussoirs
- chamfered inner edge of the pilasters
- brick arch on the facade
- louvered attic vent
- corbelled brick frieze
- brick chimney
- windows with segmented arches of two rowlock brick courses and lug sills
- two over four double hung windows
- marble date stone
- marble stone inscribed with the words “OCCUPY TIL I COME”