6. Sacred Heart of Jesus Church NEAR GOOD TRANSPORTATION. Founded in 1876 Sacred Heart Church answered the spiritual needs of recently arrived, predominantly Irish immigrants. By the mid 1870s they had settled near the horsecar line that ran along Ninth Avenue, connecting the Wall Street area to the West Side, as far north as 59th Street. The horsecar was the form of mass transportation that predated the electrified streetcar and the elevated railway, or "el".

THE ART AND UTILITY OF TERRA-COTTA. The present church, erected in 1885, replaced an older one on the same site. The architect, Napoleon LeBrun, also designed the Metropolitan Life Insurance Building and Tower at Madison Avenue and 23rd Street, a number of fire houses, and St. Cecelia's Church at 120 East 106th Street. Both Sacred Heart and St. Cecelia's have elegant facades of red terra-cotta. Looking at Sacred Heart Church, note the skillfully repeated geometric pattern of the terra-cotta, set against the red brick and in contrast with the white stone arches. A popular building material of the 1870s, terra-cotta, from the Italian for "baked earth, " was lightweight, inexpensive, fireproof, and easy to mold.

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