text: On the northwestern corner of the future Citigroup Center site was St. Peter's Lutheran Church, which had been founded in 1862 as a German-speaking congregation. The St. Peter's congregation occupied a building at Lexington Avenue and 46th Street from 1871 to 1902, when it was demolished for the construction of Grand Central Terminal. This prompted the congregation to move to a Gothic building designed by John G. Michel and P. Brandner, which was completed in 1905. The congregation, which at its peak had a membership of over one thousand, had decreased to below 300 by the 1960s, prompting the congregation to consider relocating to near the United Nations headquarters.
  Planning
  Site acquisition
  Lots on the St. Peter's block were acquired secretively starting in 1968 and continued for five and a half years. The acquisition was headed by brokers Donald Schnabel and Charles McArthur of Julien J. Studley Inc. The brokers believed that a large, contiguous land lot would be worth more than the sum of each lot's individual worth, though the firm had not yet secured a client for which it was purchasing the lots. St. Peter's Church's membership was increasing again by then, and members of the congregation were loath to part with their property. A Studley broker formed a company called Lexman, which then approached what had become First National City Bank to determine their interest in the St. Peter's block, one block east of their headquarters at the time. Lexman gradually acquired the other lots on the block.