Old Indian Meeting House

Old Indian Meeting House
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Location	Mashpee, Massachusetts
Coordinates
Built	1684
Architect	Hinckley, Deacon John
Architectural style	Colonial, Greek Revival, Italianate
NRHP Reference #	98001383
Added to NRHP	December 3, 1998

See also: List of the oldest buildings in Massachusetts

The Old Indian Meeting House (also known as the Old Indian Church) is a historic meeting house at 410 Meetinghouse Road in Mashpee, Massachusetts. The meetinghouse is the oldest Native American church in the eastern United States and the oldest church on Cape Cod.

The church was built in 1684 by Deacon John Hinckley on the site of an earlier Indian meetinghouse built in 1670. It was used by the Wampanoag Native Americans as a Christian church. In 1717 the church was moved from its original location in the town to its current one, and the building was remodeled. The building also served as a school. In the late eighteenth century, a cemetery ("burial ground") was founded on the church grounds.

With almost four centuries of Native American leadership and ministry, the Old Meeting House is a place of historic and spiritual significance to the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe. In 1833 it was the site of the famous Mashpee Revolt, when tribal members and their minister, William Apess (Pequot), protested state intrusions on their self-governance, and white settlers' theft of wood from tribal lands. The site was re-dedicated in 1923 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1998. In 2009, the Mashpee tribe celebrated its reconstruction and formal re-opening.

File:Old Indian Meeting House Church in Mashpee MA.jpg

Old Indian Meeting House in 2009

See also

• Oldest churches in the United States
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Barnstable County, Massachusetts