The Shrine Church of the Most Precious Blood is located at 113 Baxter Street between Canal and Hester streets. The church building was completed in 1904, and then interior decorations and sacred art followed.
 
The First Parishioners
Beginning in the latter part of the 19th Century, Italian immigrants seeking better lives in America began arriving in large numbers. Waves of immigrants who settled in lower Manhattan in the early 1900s formed a neighborhood eventually known as Little Italy.
 
Opportunities were challenging for immigrants in their new land. Families were crammed into overcrowded, dismal and often unsanitary tenements. Italian immigrants, shunned by established New Yorkers, were not permitted to worship in the sanctuaries of established church structures, but were relegated to make-shift areas in basements. Many of the Italian immigrants in the vicinity of the present Most Precious Blood Church worshipped in the basement of the nearby Transfiguration Church on Mott Street.

Recognizing the unique situation of these immigrants, in 1888 the Vatican decreed the establishment of a National Parish to serve the rapidly growing population. A group of Scalabrini Fathers of the St. Charles Borromeo Society were designated to form the Most Precious Blood Italian National Parish. Three years later, the Scalabrini Fathers  had purchased land at 113 Baxter Street and commenced construction of the church.
 
The First Builders
The Scalabrini Fathers began building the Lower Church, designed by William Schickel & Company, in 1891. Bavarian-trained William Schickel worked in partnership with Isaac E. Ditmars and Hugo Kafka and, beginning with the Church of St. Vincent Ferrer in 1879, was responsible for many buildings for the New York Diocese. Shickel’s German background was reflected in the design style of many of these structures, but for Most Precious Blood, he provided an Italian Franciscan style structure, which may have been due to a mid-construction change of management.
 
After construction began, the Scalabrini Fathers realized construction management was a tremendous responsibility and difficult, and requested that the Archdiocese find a more appropriate group to complete the construction project.
 
With a debt on the property of about $100,000, in 1894 the Archbishop approached the Provincial Minister of the Franciscan order, the Order of Friars Minor, who were at the time building Saint Anthony of Padua Church on Sullivan Street successfully.
 
The Franciscans
The Franciscans agreed to assist with Most Precious Blood Church on the condition that the debt would first be paid off before efforts to raise money for the Upper Church began. The Franciscan friars took over construction of the building and began ministering to the parish. On July 7, 1901, the cornerstone was laid for the Upper Church.
 
Traditions of Saints, Statues and Icons
Inside the nave of Most Precious Blood are numerous statues, icons and great works of art. The veneration of saints through worship, statues, relics and icons has been a cultural tradition in Italy for centuries, and a common practice in other parts world. Soon after opening for worship, various groups, or societies, requested permission from church authorities to admit specific statues or icons related to their former, Italian home cities, towns and villages, in Most Precious Blood.
 
Immigrants from Naples and the Campania region of Italy were numerous among Mulberry Street residents, and they brought with them to New York their devotion to Saint Januarius—San Gennaro, in modern Italian—a third-century Roman martyr who is the patron saint of Naples and whose feast day is September 19th. The Franciscan friars supplied the church with a relic of San Gennaro’s 1,700-year-old dried blood.
 
The San Gennaro Feast, initiated in America as a religious tribute, was observed on one day, September 19 ^th, with a Mass and with great solemnity. Over the years, the event grew to include a procession of the statue through the streets of Little Italy followed by a street fair, which now spans eleven days. Most Precious Blood Church is home to the National Shrine of San Gennaro, which is contained in a magnificent chapel.
 
Neapolitan Italian immigrants considered San Gennaro their protector in America. They called upon him—as they had in Italy—to protect them from natural disasters, fire, misfortune and illnesses. In America, where Italian immigrants faced new difficulties, they turned to San Gennaro for intercession to protect them from childhood diseases, polio, influenza, and tuberculosis, which were common in their poor neighborhoods.
 
Many of the substandard living conditions documented by author and photo journalist Jacob Riis in his book How the Other Half Lives were in the notorious ‘Five Points’ and Mulberry Bend slum neighborhood that was steps from the new parish’s church.
 
Construction of the Main Church
After the basement level was roofed over, services were held below ground in what is now the basement hall, while the necessary funds were raised to complete the sanctuary.  

At the time, the Church of the Most Precious Blood was baptizing around 2,000 Italian babies every year, and there were about ten weddings every Sunday.
Finally, although the debt had been reduced only to $65,000, construction of the upper church began. On July 7, 1901, Archbishop Corrigan laid the cornerstone which contained U.S. and Italian coins, the names of the Archbishop, other clergymen and President William McKinley, and other documents.
 
Three years later, in 1904, the infrastructure and basic interior elements of the church were completed. Monsignor Falconio, Apostolic Delegate from the Vatican, was present at its dedication on April 17, 1904, along with visiting clergy, civic and religious societies, parishioners and the Italian Rifle Guards.
 
In 1909, Ray Stannard Baker would write in  The American Magazine: “It is a large new church, with a lively able priest at the head of it. It is attended exclusively by Italians—the poorest people in the neighborhood, and yet that church has been built complete in fifteen years out of the pennies of poor people: and it is supported to-day by their offerings.”
 
What’s Inside?
 
The Shrine Church of Most Precious Blood has some of the finest examples of sacred art in America.
 
Its marble main altar and side altars, all with religious statuary, display marvelous craftsmanship by Borgia Marble Works of New York.
 
From 1914 to 1917, Donatus Buongiorno, an Italian immigrant from Solofra, Italy, in the Province of Avellino, who became an American citizen, designed and specified the interior decorating of the church—in Neapolitan Baroque style. He chose paint colors and decorative painted finishes for walls and trim, such as the geometric pattern on the apse wall behind the altar, faux stone painting of columns and gilding of capitals, corbels and picture frames. 
 
He sketched designs for beautiful stained glass windows which were fabricated by others and paid for through the generosity of Italian immigrant individuals, businesses and groups who became successful in America. They all exist intact today.
 
Buongiorno, who trained at the then-Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Naples (today: Accademia di Belle Arti di Napoli) in the 1880s, created the 30 oil painting murals of religious scenes on the church's walls and ceilings, including five Crucifixion scenes behind the main altar and in the ceiling of the apse—referring to the church's name, Christ's blood upon Crucifixion—three saints depicted on the nave's ceiling, ten angelic  putti in ceiling window vaults, two scenes from the life of Christ to the left and right of the main altar, five scenes from the life of Saint Francis of Assisi and five scenes from the life of Saint Anthony of Padua on the walls of the side aisles and above the two side altars—a tribute to patron saints of the Franciscan friars who staffed the church during most of its existence.
 
Buongiorno and his works, including this church commission, have been listed in Who's Who in American Art since 1917.
 
Rededication in 1997
By the late 20th Century, the building suffered from water leakage and general disrepair. A complete, two-year renovation was initiated in 1995. The work was entrusted to Gargiulo Brothers Construction Company of Mount Vernon, New York.
 
Oil paintings inside were restored, and the exteriors and interiors of the building were cleaned and repaired throughout. Besides receiving a totally refurbished interior, the beautiful paintings that grace the ceiling and walls of the church were restored by professional artists.
 
On February 7, 1997, the Church was re-consecrated by His Eminence, John Cardinal O'Connor.
 
Today at the Shrine Church of Most Precious Blood
Since its merger with Saint Patrick’s Old Cathedral, the Shrine Church of Most Precious Blood has experienced a renaissance of spirit, traditions and activities. Along with traditional groups associated with Most Precious Blood, faith worship groups that now call Most Precious Blood their home include the Saint Rocco Society of Potenza and the Craco Society. 
 
The Future
While programs are ongoing, the Shrine Church of Most Precious Blood is again in need of repairs: major infrastructure and other major capital improvements are necessary.
 
The future depends on your encouragement, support, involvement and prayer. Visit the Shrine Church of Most Precious Blood, a truly historic place of worship in America.
 
Sources:
The Daytonian in Manhattan, ‘The 1904 Church of the Most Precious Blood,’ April 11, 2011, www.daytonianinmanhattan.blogspot.com/2011/04/1904.
 
Janice Carapellucci, www.donatusbuongiorno.com.
 
‘History of The Most Precious Blood Church,’ Parish Annuals document from Archives of The Shrine Church of Most Precious Blood.
 
The Commemorative Journal: ‘Most Precious Blood Church, Rededication & Consecration by His Eminence John Cardinal O’Connor, Archbishop of New York,’ February 7, 1998.