April 19, 1966: “The steeple was pulled down from old St. James United Church, which is being demolished to make way for a new structure.“
After reading those words in the North Star, I drove up to Parry Sound from Toronto. It looked like an ugly gap in a well-loved smile, the beautiful spire gone forever from the familiar streetscape.
The St. James Methodist Church was built in 1877 to replace the first church in Parry Sound, the Methodist Church sited near the present railway bridge.
The church members commissioned leading Canadian architect Henry Langley. Among his Toronto commissions was the Yorkville Town Hall. The Chapel of the Necropolis, the spire of St. Michael’s Cathedral, and the Metropolitan United Church are his work. The city of Guelph owes much of its character to Langley’s skill.
When Jack Thompson photographed the church early in 1966, it was already doomed. The church wardens had been told that seemingly, no amount of engineering could repair it. Rumours flew then, and persist today, that it could have been saved.
On the contrary, John Macfie, who served on the church’s board of stewards, recalls that, “A government agency overseeing building safety condemned the [wooden] building and literally put the congregation out of it. Services were held in the high school while much agonizing was done over what to do.” Eventually they agreed to demolish and rebuild.
Among Langley’s creations, the magnificent Lieutenant-Governor’s residence, Chorley Park, also fell to the wrecker’s ball, but Yorkville Town Hall remains, a treasured part of the cityscape, as do Langley’s many Toronto Sanctuaries, honoured in a recent exhibition at the Toronto Public Library.
Another church has passed into history within the last dozen years. The Roman Catholic parishioners in Parry Sound have had three churches.
An historical plaque describes the site of the first little church on Emily Street. Judge Patrick McCurry donated the land, and the Jesuits built the church in 1869.
When I was a child, our Bay Street neighbour Celena Villeneuve recounted that as a young girl she had crossed the CPR trestle as a shortcut to get to Mass, but she was utterly terrified. There was nowhere to escape from a train.
In 1933, St. Peter’s was built on Church Street, with its matching rectory, using materials from the demolished church on Emily Street.
In their turn, they were both demolished and replaced in 1996 by the larger church, St. Peter the Apostle, with the rectory and hall tucked in behind. In a heart-warming nod to its history, the church members added the 1996 date to the original cornerstone before placing it near the front steps.
Steeple changes
Date: Feb 05, 2010
By the time this photo was taken by Jack Thompson in 1966 of the St. James United Church the beautiful church was already doomed.
User Comments
