09/10/2025
Enoch Pratt was born today, September 10, in 1808. At First Unitarian, September is the month we remember our most eminent and stalwart member of First Unitarian, Enoch Pratt, as it is the month of both his birth and his death in 1896. In 2008, First Unitarian, along with the Enoch Pratt Free Library and the Maryland Historical Society, celebrated the bicentennial of Pratt’s birth with proclamations, celebrations, and the reissue of Pratt’s biography. Here at First Unitarian, we renamed and dedicated the Parish Hall—one of his gifts to the congregation—in his honor.
As Richard Hart observes in the beginning of his biography Enoch Pratt: The Story of a Plain Man, “To the end of his days he had an unshakable, though perhaps outmoded, prejudice in favor of giving honest value for what he received. The bulk of his fortune was employed for the good of his fellow citizens, rather than in idle display or in assuring leisure for his family’s descendents.” Further, he concludes, “In the evolution of Enoch Pratt’s character can be traced a developing strain of humanity and public spirit which in his later years broadened so that it became the guiding power of his life. When he came to Baltimore in 1831 his chief ambition was honest success in business. He grew with the city’s growth. His earlier benefactions prepared the way for the two great gifts [the library and hospital that bear his name] that marked the culmination of his career…In Enoch Pratt was found that rare combination of visionary and man of action which can accomplish a worthwhile end in the face of discouragement and misunderstanding.”
It would be difficult to overestimate Enoch Pratt’s importance to The First Unitarian Church of Baltimore where he was a member from 1831 until his death. He served on its Board of Trustees from 1848-1893, as Treasurer from 1842-1860 and as President from 1860-1893. He gave a number of substantial gifts, including the Pratt Parish Hall and the Henry Niemann organ in the sanctuary. During his time of service on the Board, he arranged a deal in which he took care of the Church’s debt and he modeled congregational investment in all aspects of church life by insisting that others who could supported the Church, as well. In addition, he gave generously to the Unitarian Seminary in Pennsylvania, Meadville Theological School (now called Meadville Lombard and located in Chicago).
Pictured is a bust of Enoch Pratt carved by his protege, sculptor Edwin Sheffield Bartholomew . It is in an alcove above the steps on the main staircase in the Central Enoch Pratt Free Library on Cathedral Street.
