A brief history with photos

The congregation of First Lutheran was organized in 1904, when several Lutheran families of Norwegian descent moved to Kennewick from Genesee, Idaho, and began farming on the irrigated land near the Columbia River. Their worship services were conducted in Norwegian. Through the years the congregation has met in several buildings and merged with other Lutheran bodies. The first worship services were held in parishioner's homes, then held in a hall above Hawkin's Saloon on Main Street, now known as Kennewick Avenue. Members combined with the German Lutheran Congregation (Bethlehem Lutheran) until the German group established its own congregation in 1909. The two congregations still shared a building and parochial school until 1919 when the Norwegian Lutherans arranged joint services with the Zion Lutheran Congregation of the Wisconsin Synod. Members of the Wisconsin Synod Congregation joined what was then known as First Lutheran of Kennewick, late in 1919, and were served with their first resident pastor. The church building, on Ione Street, is now the Odd Fellows Hall. In 1935 the congregation moved to a building at Second and Auburn Street in Kennewick, which now houses the Pentecostal Church. First Lutheran's current building on Yelm Street and Highway 395, was built in 1957 and was expanded in 1978