First German Reformed Church

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First German Reformed Church was a historic church in Waukesha, Wisconsin, located at 413 Wisconsin Avenue. Built in 1891 for the German-speaking immigrant community, it was designed by Hugo C. Haeuser and built by George Ward, and it cost about $8,000. The building was later listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991.

The congregation began in 1866 when Professor H. Kurtz, a missionary from Germany, started the Erste Deutsche Reformierte Kirche. By 1880 they worshiped in a large stone building that had been built in 1840 to house Prairieville Academy, which became Carroll College. By 1890 the church needed a bigger home, so they tore down the old building and erected the 1891 church on the same site. The new church had cream-brick walls on a limestone foundation, tall round-arched windows, and a central north tower with the main entrance at its base.

Inside, two rows of pews faced the south altar, with plaster walls and wooden wainscoting. The space rose to the collar beams and had a flat ceiling. Services were in German for many years, shifting to both German and English around World War I.

In 1924–25 an annex was added to the east to accommodate more members, designed to match the 1891 building. The church also received a Wangerin-Weickhardt pipe organ in the early 1900s. In the late 1940s the congregation bought a new parsonage, turned the old one into a parish house, and repurposed the old garage as a youth cottage. By the 1950s membership exceeded 1,000, and a modern brick education building and new entry were added in 1956.

In 1934 the denomination merged with others into the Evangelical and Reformed Church, and the church became the First Evangelical and Reformed Church of Waukesha. In 1956 the denomination joined the United Church of Christ, and the church’s name changed again to Evangelical and Reformed United Church of Christ.

In December 2005 a fire destroyed the 1891 building. The congregation rebuilt a new church on the same site.