The Texas Panhandle’s oldest Catholic Church is scheduled to be demolished next Monday, September 9, more than two years after it was damaged in an automobile accident.
St. Mary’s Catholic Church parish member Chriss Clifford told the Enterprise Tuesday that Jordan Green has been hired to do the work after the church spent much time trying to figure out the best way to move forward.
On Sunday, April 23, 2017, just a few months after St. Mary’s celebrated the opening of its new Parish Hall, the unfortunate accident occurred during the church’s annual fundraiser barbecue. After the collision, Clifford said church members entered the building to find that pews had been thrown about by the impact.
“We knew something bad was wrong,” Clifford said.
As insurance adjusters and an engineer began to look at the situation, the church moved its weekly mass to the new Parish Hall; and within 30 days the stained glass windows – created by parishioners themselves just ten years earlier – were removed from the building.
“We were afraid they were would break from the strain on the walls,” Clifford said.
The church learned the collision had broken the floor plate as well as several floor joists and that stress was being put on the roof of the 1892 building that was built by Irish immigrants working for the railroad.
Understanding the historical significance of the building, preservation architect and Preservation Texas board member Chuck Lynch was brought in to help determine whether the church could be saved.
“No one wanted to save it more than him,” Clifford said.
Clifford said a storm in the early 1900s took the church’s gothic roof and bell tower. Afterwards, as the roof was lowered, the gothic buttresses were removed.
“It lost a lot of historical value when those things happened,” she said.
The parish eventually decided to tear down the old building and make plans for something bigger that would fit its growing congregation, and Clifford said the parish members are generally in agreement about what’s happening.
“Everybody knows it has been severely remodeled. We have a historical site, not a historical building.”
Care is being taken, however, to reclaim as many historical elements from the church as possible.
Bead board found behind the drywall in the church has been reclaimed for use in a new building, and will be featured prominently behind the historic high altar that was restored several years ago by A Fine Feathered Nest.
The bead board will also be fitted into niches in the new church building.
Some of the original flooring has been salvaged and will be put behind the altar rail so that the priest will be standing on the original church floor. And of course the stained glass windows will be re-used.
Clifford said the new church design will mimic the original church design, bringing back the gothic roof, the buttresses, and the bell tower. The new steel and wood building will have siding that looks much like the original shiplap, but the new siding will be made of concrete.
The new church will also be slightly bigger – seating 120 instead of the old church’s capacity of 60 – and will be connected by a breezeway to the new Parish Hall.
Constructing a new church will also help meet accessibility requirements that never could have been accommodated in the space of the old church, Clifford said.
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