Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church was an outgrowth of an effort to establish a congregation for the hearing impaired German immigrants. In 1898 the first services for the hearing impaired were held at the YMCA located on 10th and LaSalle in downtown Minneapolis. Three years later regular worship services began to be held at Trinity Lutheran Church with about forty attendings representing a diversity of ethnicities and denominations. In 1909, a group of hearing-impaired people asked to establish their own congregation and erect a church. The result was the establishment of the Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church. A small white frame church with a seating capacity of 100 was constructed at 2130 Girard Avenue North; it was dedicated on September 19, 1915. The church’s beautiful Elmwood pulpit was carved by a hearing and visually impaired member of the congregation, John Lanby. The congregation’s records were destroyed in a fire.