The steepled white wood-frame church is in the simplified New England tradition. The interior is arranged with two side aisles separating three banks of pews. Twelve-over-twelve windows, four on each side and two on the front, admit ample light to the sanctuary. The Reverend Peter Dougherty (1805–1894), a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary and a Presbyterian missionary, arrived in the Grand Traverse area in 1838. He organized a Protestant mission for Native Americans at present-day Old Mission in 1843, putting up his one-and-a-half-story, side-gable, post-and-beam wooden house (Peter Dougherty Historic Homesite; 18459 Mission Road, Peninsula Township, Grand Traverse County) in 1842. He moved the mission west across Grand Traverse Bay in 1852 and built the New Mission Church on the high bluff east of Omena. The work of the mission continued until about 1870, when the boarding school was abandoned, and the church was placed under the Presbytery. Today the church holds services only during the summer.