On September 25, 1874, Dr. C. A. Evald, pastor of Augustana Lutheran Church, a Minneapolis congregation of the Minnesota Conference of the Augustana Synod, met with a group of Swedish immigrants living in the Near North Side to organize a second Swedish Lutheran congregation in the city, Svenska Evangeliska Betlehems Forsamlingen. They planned to erect a church on a lot offered by Mr. H. A. Gale, located, according to the congregation’s history, at “Lot 1, Block 18, Gale’s Addition 10th Street North.” (The History of Bethlehem Evangelical Lutheran Church of North Minneapolis, 1874-1984, p. 16.) The church, a 30 by a 40-foot frame building, was erected in 1875 but was moved three years later to 6th Street North between 11th and 12th Avenues. The congregation struggled in its early years: in January 1878 it had sixteen members, sixty cents in its treasury, no pastor, and no regular services. Finally, in July 1884, the congregation called a newly-ordained pastor who apparently revitalized the congregation, because four years later the congregation purchased property at 14th Avenue and Lyndale and erected a new church. Dedicated on June 14, 1891, the new church was monumental in size and appearance in stark contrast to the congregation’s earlier structure. Now known as Bethlehem Swedish Lutheran Church, the Gothic Revival edifice built of buff brick and brownstone and with large stained glass windows, had a seating capacity of 1,000 and a corner tower that soared skyward 125 feet.
Just about the time that Bethlehem’s new church was dedicated, many of its congregants began to move further north as the result of their improved economic status that was concomitant with the expansion of public transportation opening up more tracts of land for settlement. Recognizing this, Bethlehem founded a mission in 1893 at 42nd and Dupont Avenue North that two years later became an independent congregation, Salem Lutheran Church. That same year Bethlehem organized a Sunday School located in a small frame chapel at 4th Street North and Lowry Avenue that was to serve the children in the neighborhood. Unlike Bethlehem that used Swedish until 1931, the Chapel conducted its services and classes only in English, thus appealing to second-generation settlers regardless of their ethnic identity. Although the congregation prospered and grew, all was not harmonious at Bethlehem Lutheran. In 1912 twenty-two members withdrew from the church to form a new congregation, called Bethel, located at 30th and Emerson Avenue North. It is interesting to note that the alleged reason given for the split is that some members of the Board “objected to the pastor giving time to help the poor and unemployed persons who were not members of the church” (ibid., 22). There is no question that in the first decade of the 20th century, the Near North Side had already begun its slide downward, and it is not too surprising that in the Progressive Era the pastor felt compelled to reach out to the needy in the church’s changing neighborhood. It was also inevitable that Bethlehem if it was going to survive would have to follow in the footsteps of its departing congregants. In 1928, the congregation began construction of a new church at the corner of 22nd Avenue North and Fremont. Dedicated in 1929, the edifice was smaller than the Lyndale church with a seating capacity of 700, but it had large spacious Sunday School rooms and a full basement that could house other activities, including a Boy Scout Troop and Mission band.