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The Church of the Crucifixion located at 149th Street and Convent Avenue in Harlem, built in 1969, was founded in 1916 by Jedidiah Ohmead for the West Indian Episcopalian community of the neighborhood in need of a space of worship. To this day, the demographics of its congregation remains primarily West Indian and African American. In 1963, a fire destroyed the church’s original building, and a new house of worship for the Church of the Crucifixion arose in the same lot. In this documentary, we will discuss how the new building for the Church of the Crucifixion attempted to renew hope within its community through its style, use of concrete as a material, and monumentality. The first way was through brutalism’s employment of rough, bare materials. The exposed concrete of the new building, a material more fire resistant than wood, expressed safety to the community. The perceived durability and resistant nature of its concrete walls made a significant statement at the time, since the burning down of the original building was believed to have been the consequence of a race-related arson. To understand why racially motivated arson might have been on the community’s mind, it is important to understand the context of Harlem in the 1960s. Not only was New York’s economy beginning to decline, the burning of the church happened in 1963, at the height of the civil rights movement. The fire happened in the same year Martin Luther King marched on Washington and Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam. In 1964 the race riots of Harlem took place after the deadly shooting of an unarmed black teenager, and in 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights, not far from the church's location. It is difficult to find actual evidence of malfeasance. In fact, a newspaper article from around the time hypothesizes that the mysterious fire was caused by a dog who was found dead in the church basement. In interviews I have conducted with members of the congregation, as well as individuals living in the neighborhood; a theory of arson seemed to be the commonly held belief at this time.