From their inception, churches have played a vital role in Bellport, Brookhaven and the neighboring communities. Solace, sanctuary and support, these churches have celebrated the joyful and comforted the afflicted, built communities, provided hospitality and advocated for justice since the eighteenth century.
This exhibition, Community and Congregation: Ten Churches, is designed to explore the history of our churches and to convey the many and varied ways they have contributed to making our area what it is today. In addition to the Gallery exhibit, which will feature timelines, archival materials, photographs and a variety of objects loaned by the churches themselves, there will be accompanying programs exploring in greater depth the unique histories of several of our churches in serving their congregants as the population of wester Suffolk country grew and changed between the nineteenth and twenty-first centuries.
The Gallery Exhibition is expected to run during March 14-May 23 2026.
The churches!
- Christ Episcopal Church
- Mary Immaculate Roman Catholic Church
- Bellport United Methodist Church
- New Bethel First Pentecostal Church
- St. James Episcopal Church
- Old South Haven Presbyterian Church
- Ruth African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church
- The Journey Church
- St. Joseph the Worker RC Church
- Cornerstone Christian Cultural Center “C4”
Click here for Children’s Events
The Walter Granville-Smith Catalog is available for purchase in the gallery
or please click here to have it shipped.
Letter to Members
Hello there,
Since I became the president of this organization a year ago, I have grown to appreciate more than ever how important it is in the life of this community. It connects me to more of you every day, and with the fragmentation of our political and social life that is inevitable with the web and social media, I think it’s especially important to gather in person to build the kind of bonds that can only develop by sharing space, ideas, and food!
If you’re getting this letter, you’ve either been a member or have been to one of our events. We thank you for your interest in what we do, and hope we can entice you to renew your membership or become a new member. In the past few months, we’ve been looking hard at our membership benefits, and have concluded that we need to make the advantages more clear. In that spirit, we have a whole new set of membership tiers and they all come with benefits that weren’t previously included.
Individual memberships, $75 a year, will now include discounted tickets to lectures, readings, openings, and free admission to invite-only events like our annual holiday party. Our $250 patron membership, a new offering, will include free tickets to all lectures, readings, openings and events like the holiday party, plus the right to rent out our property for events. There are several more options; details about all the tiers are on our website here.
Our members help to sustain us financially but also create the sense of community that is so important to all of us, developed around a deeper understanding of our history. In the past year, we held a number of new events, including a modern house tour, a film night with Isabella, a garden party, a fiddle concert and a poetry reading. We also expanded to three major exhibitions. Next year, we’re planning a spring exhibition on the churches of the area and how the community evolved around them. In the summer, we’ll be celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence with a show called Before the Revolution, when Bellport was Occumbomac and Brookhaven was Fireplace. We will also have many new programs, lectures, and special events for both adults and children.
Please consider joining, renewing or giving a membership as a holiday gift.
And even if this isn’t the year for you to do that, please keep attending our events. We look forward to seeing you!
Best regards,
Trish Hall
President, Board of Trustees
