90 Hasell St., Charleston, South Carolina. County/parish: Charleston.
Added to the National Register of Historic Places April 04, 1978. NRIS 78002499.
1 contributing building.Also known as:
Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim (Hebrew: קהל קדוש בית אלוהים, lit. 'Holy Congregation House of God', also known as K. K. Beth Elohim, or more simply Congregation Beth Elohim) is a Reform Jewish congregation and synagogue located in Charleston, South Carolina, in the United States.
Having founded the congregation in 1749, it was later claimed to be the first Reform synagogue located in the United States. The congregation's first synagogue, in the Georgian Revival style, was built in 1793–1794 and destroyed in an 1838 fire that ravished Charleston's central business district, impacting 500 properties over approximately 150 acres (61 ha). The current architecturally significant Greek Revival synagogue located at 90 Hasell Street, completed in 1840, was designed by Cyrus L. Warner and built by enslaved African descendants owned by David Lopez Jr, a prominent slaveowner and proponent of the Confederate States of America.
The congregation is one of the oldest Jewish congregations in the United States. The congregation is nationally significant as the place where ideas resembling Reform Judaism were first evinced.
(read more...)National Park Service documentation: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/118997366