The Rev. Ray F. Carter, the church’s 14th minister, came in 1904 and remained our pastor until 1909.  Rev. Carter then left the ministry and went into the real estate and insurance business.

Rev. Carter and his family were the first to occupy our new parsonage, which was located where the Western Auto Store is now.  As of 1998, this is now the property of the Serfino’s Drug Store.

In a letter written in 1943, by Rev. Carter to a member of our church the former minister recalls a few humorous events, which took place during his life here in Southington.  He recalls that Mr. Knapp built the tool shed and chicken house after they were settled, and later the Ladies’ Aid Society had him finish a study and a maid’s room in the attic.  It was from a window in this study that Rev. Carter could hear his son and another boy who were obviously fighting.  The boy, who will remain nameless, said, "I will come over on your side of the street if I want to, even if your old man is a priest."

One of the first jobs Rev. Carter had around the parsonage was to put up a fence to keep the children off the streets, which were beginning to carry automobile traffic.  This fence one man, Mr. Lyman Andrews, called "the Kid cage."

Rev. Carter goes on, "I shall neve forget the time I was ordained and installed.  The Council took so much time trying to make over my queer (to them) ideas, that the ladies finally issued an ultimatum, and we sat down to supper around 7:30.  In spite of my queer ideas, I found whom I loved and who for some reason took us into their hearts and homes.  I have never gotten over the separation.  No other pastorate has ever been the same, and many times I have had the feeling that I have had but one church.

"The very name of New England still stirs me, and the memory of the old steeple still haunts me.  I have so many memories of the dear folk who listened to me, as I blundered along, trying to find myself, and who gave me much loyalty and affection.  I have never found anything like it since."