Established on October 24, 1859, this congregation met in the Old Cataract House on Washington Avenue and 6th Avenue South. Later meetings in the 1860s were held in Morrison Hall and Harrison Hall. In October 1866 the congregation moved into a frame building it erected (address unknown). This building seated 400 and included a fresco, reputedly the first in the city, along with an organ built in Minneapolis. The building was later sold to the German Methodists. In 1875, the congregation relocated to a new building then under construction at the corner of 8th Street and 2nd Avenue. This building was destroyed by fire on January 25, 1888. The congregation then erected a new building on the site, 805 2nd Avenue South, dedicating it on November 24, 1889. This congregation founded the Unity Settlement House, the first institution of its kind in Minneapolis, in 1897, in an "old frame building" at 250 17th Avenue North.
- Works Progress Administration. Works Progress Administration Field Reports. [Lillian.] and Hallgrain [Grayce.] Wallace, February 24, 1836. "The History of First Universalist," First Universalist Church of Minneapolis. http://firstuniversalistchurch.org/the-history-of-first-universalist/