Church of the Most Holy Trinity

Founded in 1841, and in its current building since the 1880s, the Church of the Most Holy Trinity casts a long shadow across its Brooklyn neighborhood. The French Gothic church looms over the low rises of Williamsburg, its grandeur and ornateness contrasting with the mundane aluminum-sided architecture of its half-working class, half-hipster surroundings. Thanks to Father Timothy Dore and the inquisitive folks at Urban Oyster, we recently got to tour the building (including the parapets!) and learn about its history.

Built to serve the area's once-vast and upwardly mobile German population, then adopted by the Italians who made their way through the area in the twentieth century (one former parishioner on the tour spoke only Italian), and now the spiritual home of Latin American and Polish immigrants, Most Holy Trinity, for all that it seems anomalous on its block, tells the story of New York. Oh, and it's supposedly haunted.