Fountain Trees

Fountain Street Church (FSC) is an independent, non-denominational church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The church started out as a Baptist congregation, but it changed its views when liberal Christianity became popular in the late 1800s. Most of the people who influenced this change were graduates of the University of Chicago Divinity School, a pioneer of liberal Christianity. Established in the largest town in West Michigan in 1869 as Fountain Street Baptist Church, by 1960 FSC ended its Baptist identity to become an independent, non-denominational, and liberal church. In 1959, a book chronicling the story of Fountain Street Church titled Liberal Legacy – A History of Fountain Street Church was published in-house by Philip Buchen, a member of the church and legal advisor to President Gerald Ford.