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Celebrating our lives together in Christ |
 In 2005, two gathering spaces in the Parish
Center at All Saints were renamed to honor key figures in the early
history of the Episcopal Church in Appleton.
Room 10, on the lower level, became
Jackson Kemper Hall, and Room 22, where coffee hours are held
after Sunday 10:00 a.m. services, has been designated the Simeon Palmer Fellowship Room (pictured).
The
Rt. Rev. Jackson Kemper,
first missionary bishop of the Episcopal Church in America and first
bishop of Wisconsin, conducted the first Episcopal services in Appleton
in 1854 or 1855. In the autumn of 1856 an official parish was
organized.
On October 27, 1857, Holy Communion was administered for the first
time, one baptism was held, and Bishop Kemper confirmed the first class
in Appleton. He presided over the laying of the cornerstone of the
first Grace Church building in June 1864.
He founded Nashotah House and Racine College and
supported a more
extensive outreach to the Indian peoples and translations of the
Scriptures and the services of the church into Indian languages. From
1859 till his death in 1870, he was bishop of Wisconsin, but his
influence was felt through the frontier territories. His feast day is
May 24.
The Rev. Simeon Palmer, the first “regular missionary” priest in
Appleton, divided his time between Appleton and Menasha, where he
lived. In July 1862, he began services, first in the courthouse and
then, until January 1864, in Warner’s Hall. The Episcopal congregation
then worshiped in the Baptist Church until Palmer “pressed forward”
fund-raising for and construction of the first permanent building,
named Grace Church, at the northwest corner of Appleton and Edwards
(now Washington) Streets.
The Rev. Mr. Palmer lived to see construction begin but died in 1864
from typhoid fever “contracted during a period of overwork” before the
building was completed. A memorial stone in the narthex of All Saints
Church is inscribed: “In memory of Rev. Simeon Palmer, rector of this
parish, died Oct. 23, 1864, aged 29.”
Parish history
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