Open House New York Comes to Flushing Meeting

Every October, Open House New York Weekend unlocks the doors of New York’s most important buildings, offering an extraordinary opportunity to experience the city and meet the people who design, build, and preserve New York.

This year, Open House New York will visit Flushing Meeting on the weekend of October 18 — 20, 2019. You can sign up and get more information via https://ohny.org/sites/flushingquakermeetinghouse .

Visit Flushing Meeting during Open House New York weekend (October 18 — 20, 2019) for free guided tours of our historic meetinghouse and grounds.

Built in 1694, the Flushing Quaker Meeting House is the oldest house of worship in New York and is still in use by the Religious Society of Friends more than 300 years later. Visitors to the meetinghouse have included George Washington, John Woolman, and William Penn.

The meetinghouse is a national, state, and city landmark, recognized as a rare example of Medieval ecclesiastical architecture and serves as a symbol of the first successful struggle for religious freedom in America — centered around the 1657 Flushing Remonstrance, in which local farmers opposed Dutch director-general Peter Stuyvesant’s persecution of Quakers, Jews, Muslims, and others seeking freedom of conscience in the New World.

The meetinghouse also witnessed the beginnings of the movements to abolish slavery, establish public education, and enact women’s suffrage.

The meetinghouse remains today much as when it was first built, with dark, warm oak floorboards, simple benches and hand-hewn timber ceiling beams. To step across the threshold is to leave the present behind and to enter a profoundly sacred space seasoned by centuries of devotion. For visitors, the meetinghouse is a peaceful reminder of an eventful and historic past.

More information and registration available via https://ohny.org/sites/flushingquakermeetinghouse

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