Mead invited to attend." " At a meeting of the Society of the upper end of Salem, «nth of May, 1779, at the upper Presbyterian Meeting House," it was voted " that Jesse Trusdale, Solomon Close and Nathaniel Delavan should form a committee for one year to get preaching."

In the records of the North Salem Presbyterian Society is the following : -- " Agreeable to notice, the Society met at the meeting-house on the 21st day of June, 1840. Richard Lockwood was elected moderator, and John Close was appointed secretary. On motion, resolved, that a quit-claim of the land whereon the Presbyterian meeting-house now stands, eiven by Jesse Close to the said Society, be recorded in the County Clerk's office."a

The first settled pastor appears to have been the Rev. Joel Benedict, in 1783. This individual was the son of Peter Benedict of North Salem, who was deacon of this church for many years, and grandson of Deacon James Benedict,6 of Ridgefield, brother also of the Rev. Abner Benedict, pastor of the Presbyterian church in this place, somewhere between 1787 and 1792, and of Lieut. Peter Benedict, of the Revolution. The Rev. Joel Benedict was graduated A. M., at Princeton, in 1765, from whence he received his degree of D. D., and was settled in the ministry at Lisbon, Conn., eleven years ; and afterwards, leaving North Salem, was settled at Plainfield, Conn., where he died February, 13, 1816.

The incorporation of this church took place on the 1st of February, 1786, under the style of the " Congregationalist Society in Upper Salem ; " John Piatt, Benjamin Wood, Abraham Lockwood, David Smith, Bonage Starr, and Moses Richard, trustees.*