Beginning May 3, the anti-immigrant American Republican Party held rallies in the Irish Catholic neighborhood of Kensington, provoking violence from its residents.

The rioting reached its peak on May 8, when St. Michael's Church and its rectory, a Catholic school, and dozens of houses and businesses were burned.

As the state militia struggled to regain control in Kensington, another nativist mob burned St. Augustine's Church in the Old City neighborhood of Philadelphia.

The Kensington riots may have been more anti-Irish than anti-Catholic — the nativists did not attack the German Catholic church under construction at 5th Street and present-day Girard Avenue.

Girard Avenue Historic District – located between the school and Broad Street – features architecturally significant residential and religious buildings.

Girard Avenue West Historic District – located between the school and 29th Street – features architecturally significant commercial and residential buildings.

Brewerytown Historic District – located between 30th Street and East Fairmount Park – features architecturally significant residential and industrial buildings.

The Berean Institute, a vocational school for mostly African American adult learners located on Girard Avenue, opened in 1899 and closed in 2012.

Girard Avenue east of Broad Street was a major shopping and entertainment district for lower North Philadelphia.

The Green Tree Tavern (1845, Joseph Singerly, architect), at Marlborough Street, is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The First Presbyterian Church of Kensington (1857, Samuel Sloan, architect), at Columbia Avenue, survives, although its tall steeple has been removed.