The authoritative source on
  early churches of New Jersey

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We've created a database and photographic inventory on more than half the 18th & 19th century churches in the state and add to it each month. We welcome and solicit all contributions and suggestions from our visitors.

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Spruce Run Lutheran Church
Lebanon Township, Hunterdon County

  

The congregation was organized in 1774 or 1775 and services, conducted every four weeks, were exclusively in German for many years. The first church was built in 1800 and the second, of stone, in 1835, as a Union church, combining Reformed and Lutheran congregations. This building was erected in 1870.

According to a local historian, "There was a Lutheran church organized here long before the first building was erected. The record dates back beyond 1775, when people came six or seven miles to worship in Frederick Fritts barn on Sunday; and the same distance to dance on weekdays, the deacon sometimes being the fiddler.”

The church is surrounded by modern housing developments, but for generations stood apart from any village or hamlet.

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Copyright (c) 2001 Frank L. Greenagel