St. James A.M.E. Zion Church, 116 Wheat St. (116 Cleveland Ave.)

The St. James African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church was chartered in 1833 by a group of 18 African-Americans who withdrew from the Methodist Episcopal Church in protest. Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass are known to have visited St. James, which was an Underground Railroad station. Designated a national historic landmark in 1982, St. James is Ithaca's oldest remaining church structure.

**This tour is from the 2003 printed "The Southside's African-American Heritage Walking Tour" brochure prepared by the Cornell-Ithaca Partnership with research by Leslyn McBean & Ingrid Bauer; modified for PocketSights by The History Center in Tompkins County in 2022. Text is unchanged from the original printing.**