Cedar Grove Lutheran Church
National Register Listing
Street Address:
1220 Cedar Grove Rd., Leesville, SC (Lexington County)
Alternate Name:
Cedar Grove Evangelical Lutheran Church
NRHP Nomination
Record Number:
S10817732058
Description and Narrative:
Cedar Grove Lutheran Church, erected 1926-27, is significant not only for its architectural sophistication, but also for its connections to Louis H. Asbury, a prominent Charlotte, North Carolina architect whose influential designs shaped the institutional architectural trends throughout the Carolinas during the early twentieth century. The church purchased the plans Asbury used in the construction of the St. John’s Lutheran Church in Statesville, North Carolina, in 1922. In addition, the adjacent Cedar Grove Cemetery is an essential contributing resource that retains its historical integrity as a vast cemetery of several hundred tombstones, which has been the traditional burying ground for Cedar Grove’s congregation since their relocation to this site (from Salem Lutheran Church) in 1857. This Late Gothic Revival building is an outstanding example of early twentieth-century Lutheran sanctuaries in rural South Carolina. Its prominent façade is characterized by a crenelated belfry capped by a multi-faceted metal shingle-clad spire with a cross finial. The belfry’s merlons and crenels are surmounted by limestone coping, a detail that is repeated throughout the building’s exterior in the amortizements on its dual oblique brick buttress piers that flank the central doorway and the northeast and southeast corners of the building. A large brick pointed, stilted arch with limestone imposts and a limestone sill surrounds the metal vent within which lie the mechanicals of the belfry. Each window is capped by a double layer pointed arch resting on limestone imposts, as well as a limestone sill. The interior of the sanctuary features a magnificent open-raftered ceiling with trussed beams suggestive of flying buttresses ending in bracketed pendant posts. Listed in the National Register November 17, 2010.
Period of Significance:
1926 – 1927
Level of Significance:
Local
Area of Significance:
Architecture
National Register Determination:
listed
Date of Certification:
November 17 2010
