As early as 1733, a Church of Christ had been organized near the Center of the Town of South Hadley. Residents of the small village of South Hadley Falls, then known as the Canal Village, felt that they needed a more conveniently located church than this, so in February of 1824 they established the South Society in South Hadley. The Constitution of this Society was signed February 26th, 1824. The Society included people of different denominations, but united in August, 1824, with local ministers to establish themselves as The South Church of Christ in South Hadley.

The first officially listed minister is Rev. John Flavel Griswold, who served the South Church 1828-1831. While services were originally held in the upper part of a brick house, later known as the Brick Chapel, increasing membership required the building of a new church meeting house, which was completed in late 1834.

The church experienced a split in 1860 which lasted for 18 years. The primary cause of the rift was dissension over the choir and its rival leaders, but other matters of church policy became a part of the dispute, including that of women’s voting during church meetings. In 1860, Rev. Richard Knight and the membership that supported him established a separate church, calling it The First Congregational Church in South Hadley Falls. This newly formed First Congregational Church received a new church building from Deacon Joseph Carew, which served as the main meeting house for services until the fire of 1947. The South Church of Christ continued to hold services at their original site until the two churches reunited.

Rev. Knight and Rev. Fisher (minister at the South Church of Christ) both resigned in 1878, which paved the way for a reunion of the two churches. New leadership chose representatives from both societies to serve as the church’s trustees, and the South Church of Christ and First Congregational Church merged in October 1878 to become The Congregational Church and Society of South Hadley Falls. On December 11th, 1918, the church became unified as a corporate body under the name of The Congregational Church of South Hadley Falls. The church continued until 2012, when the congregation voted to close its doors due to declining membership and pledges.

The Women's auxiliary groups of the church have a lot of material representation in this collection, and because of this we are able to track the various mergers and interactions between them. The Young Ladies' Benevolent Society united with the Ladies' Society in the early years of the 20th century and became The Ladies' Benevolent Society. The Ladies' Benevolent Society later merged with the Women's Missionary Society to become the Women's Guild in the 1920s. The merger that has the most documentation in our collection is that of the Women's Guild and the Junior Guild, which took place in May 1951. The two combined to form the Women's Fellowship, which continued to exist until the church closed its doors in 2012.

John Flavel Griswold

1828-1831

William Tyler

1832-1839

William W. Thayer

1839-1842

Leander Thompson

1843-1850

Porter H. Snow

1852-1854

Richard Knight

1856-1878

Samuel M. J. Merwin

1860-1867

George E. Fisher

1867-1878

Winfield S. Hawkes

1878-1887

Stephen W. Webb

1888-1894

Richard L. Swain

1894-1900

G. Walter Fiske

1900-1903

Frank E. Butler

1903-1911

Bruce W. Cronmiller

1911-1923

Allen C. Blaisdell

1924-1927

Theodore Bacheler

1928-1943

Herbert H. Bair

1943-1951

Charles N. Burn

1951-1959

Robert Dennett

1959-1966

Martin Johnson

1966-1974

Tadanori Yamashita

1974 (interim)

Charles E. Ihloff

1974-1994

R. C. MacCreary

1995-1999

M. C. Williams

2000-2002 (interim)

M. E. MacCullagh

2002-2003

J. A. Ewen

2006-2009

D. B. Szyszko

2009-2013