{"nrhp_refnum":"97000422","name":"Ten Mile River Baptist Church","other_names":["Tusten Baptist Church"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"NY 97, jct. with Cochecton Trnpk.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Tusten","county":"Sullivan County","state":"NY","lat":41.56014579400005,"lon":-75.01618574299994,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1997-05-09","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Exploration/Settlement","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A small frame Baptist meetinghouse built in 1856 on a wooded hill along N.Y. Route 97 in Tusten, Sullivan County, New York, about four miles south of Narrowsburg. The six-acre property also includes a cemetery, a period privy and stone walls.","why_significant":"The church is argued to represent the lost nineteenth century river community of Tusten (Criterion A). It is also a rare, largely unaltered example of a vernacular mid-nineteenth century Protestant meetinghouse with Greek Revival references (Criterion C). The cemetery, stone walls and privy contribute to its setting.","narrative":"Built in 1856, this small clapboard church sits on a wooded hill near the Ten Mile River, about four miles south of Narrowsburg. It is a vernacular meetinghouse with Greek Revival touches in its rectangular form and twelve-over-twelve windows. Inside are plank pews, a balcony above the vestibule, a cast iron wood stove and a paneled pulpit from 1864. A cemetery with about 100 burials, dry-laid stone walls and a nineteenth century privy complete the property. The church is tied to Tusten, a river community that thrived on lumbering and bluestone quarrying before declining in the early twentieth century. Baptists organized the congregation in 1840 and met in homes until the building was completed. Services are believed to have ended around 1920, yet the church changed very little. It is considered one of the finest examples of its type in the region. A local association has maintained it since 1969 and reconstructed the bell tower in 1995.","period_of_significance":"ca. 1840 - ca. 1920","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Mid-19th Century / Greek Revival (vernacular meetinghouse)","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Services are believed to have stopped around 1920, but the church was maintained. The Tusten Settlement Association has cared for it since 1969, rebuilt the belfry and spire in 1995, and makes it available for special services.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:51:50.577867-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_NY/97000422.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/97000422/5f7db6420a-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/97000422/5f7db6420a-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Susan Strebel Jones","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tusten_Baptist_Church_2008.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Susan Strebel Jones</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tusten_Baptist_Church_2008.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/75315046","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Mile_River_Baptist_Church","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7699249"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/new-york/sullivan-county/ten-mile-river-baptist-church-97000422/"}