 A Mrs. James A. Edgar was a devout member and wished to establish a church but at her untimely death, it was left to her father and husband to endow the church in her memory.Thus on October 7, 1863, the corner stone was laid by the Bishop of New Jersey, the Right Reverend William Henry Odenheimer.Odenheimer, along with Bishop George Washington Doane of Burlington and Bishop J. M. Wainwright of Trinity Church in New York City were the three most powerful Episcopalians in the United States at mid-century and all three commissioned Upjohn churches.