Boys Town, Nebraska Boys Town is America’s most famous orphanage and one of its best known home-grown Catholic institutions. Founded in 1917, it was the brainchild of Edward Flanagan, an Irish-born priest. It began as a simple orphanage in Omaha and over the next few decades grew into a mini-town populated by troubled youths from all over America. Immortalized by Hollywood … [Read more...]
CHURCHES OF FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT
Oak Park, Illinois; Elkins Park, Pennsylvania; Milwaukee, Wisconsin Frank Lloyd Wright, arguably the greatest architect in American history and one of the pivotal figures of the modern architecture movement, made his impact on modern church design as much as he impacted everything else (homes, commercial buildings, hotels and so on). Over the course of his career Wright … [Read more...]
SALVATION ARMY MUSEUMS
West Nyack, New York; Des Plaines, Illinois; Atlanta, Georgia; Rancho Palos Verdes, California The Salvation Army is arguably the most famous of all Protestant missionary organizations. Founded by William Booth in London in the 1860s, it made its way across the Atlantic in 1880, where it has since become the largest charitable institution in the United States. Hundreds of … [Read more...]
LUTHERAN MUSEUMS
St. Louis, Missouri The Lutheran Church has long been cognizant of its history, and in recent decades museums dedicated to Lutheran religion and culture have begun to spring up around the country. Thanks to the presence of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod headquarters in St. Louis, some of the best Lutheran museum sites can be found in the area of east-central Missouri. … [Read more...]
CAHOKIA MOUNDS
Collinsville, Illinois The Cahokia Mounds are the remains of the largest Native American settlement in the United States. Once the largest city in the Americas north of Mexico, the mounds have become one of America’s most important archaeology sites. Years of research at Cahokia have turned up not only one of the largest Native American burial sites in the United States, … [Read more...]
ISLAMIC CENTER OF AMERICA
Dearborne, Michigan The Islamic Center of America is the oldest Shi’ite mosque in the United States, and since 1964 the largest mosque in the Western Hemisphere. Its construction has been both a source of pride to Shi’ite Muslims in America as well as a source of tension between Shi’ites and Sunnis. The fact that the Islamic Center of America is larger than the Islamic … [Read more...]
MOTHER MOSQUE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa While the Islamic religion has been practiced in America since at least the 17th century, it was not until the 20th century when the first true mosques began appearing in the United States. The first known building still standing to be constructed as a mosque that was not a building acquired and converted from something else, is the Moslem Temple located … [Read more...]
JEWISH HERITAGE SITES OF CINCINNATI
Cincinnati, Ohio The City of Cincinnati was the location of the first major Jewish community in America outside of the original thirteen colonies, and features two of the ten oldest standing synagogues in the country, as well as one of the oldest and most important Jewish seminaries west of the Atlantic. Together, the Shearith Israel Temple, Plum Street Temple and original … [Read more...]
MORMON HERITAGE SITES OF ILLINOIS
Nauvoo, Illinois Between the time of the founding of the Mormon church in Palmyra, New York and the establishment of a permanent home in Salt Lake City, Utah, the Mormons worked their way across the country, settling in places like Ohio and Missouri. However, it was the settlement at Nauvoo, Illinois that is probably the most important from an historical standpoint. Many … [Read more...]
ASSYRIAN ORTHODOX PATRIARCHATE
Chicago, Illinois The Assyrian Church of the East is one of the oldest Christian churches, and also one of the least known and most mysterious. Known throughout the Middle Ages as the Nestorian Church, it broke away from the rest of the Church in the 5th century, and is not in communion with Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy or Oriental Orthodoxy. Nevertheless the … [Read more...]
