Salt Spring Island Archives
| Accession Number | |||
| Date | 2007 | ||
| Media | digital recording | Audio | mp3 √ |
| duration | 5 min. |
332_Emily-Hepburn_radio-interview_restoration-St-Pauls-Church_2007.mp3
otter.ai
15.02.2024
no
Outline
Unknown Speaker 0:00
Well for the past 127 years worshipers have been filing in for Sunday services to St. Paul's Catholic Church in Salt Spring Island. But the church has seen better days. Earlier this year, the cross on top of the church fell down because of rotting wood. That's why it's undergoing a restoration. Emily Hepburn is a member of the congregation at St. Paul's Church on Saltspring Island. And she joins us this morning on the telephone. Good morning, Emily.
Unknown Speaker 0:26
Good morning.
Unknown Speaker 0:27
I wonder if you can remind me and perhaps people who haven't been back to the island for a while it's been a few years since I was back exactly what the church looks like, can you just paint us a quick, you know, a mental image of what it looks like?
Unknown Speaker 0:37
Certainly, the churches located in Fulford harbour, just a few after you get off the ferry, a little dry to the hand of the harbor, it's commonly referred to as a little stone church. In actual fact, it's a stone made of concrete mix that was put on in order to insulate the church because in the 60s, there was no insulation in the church, and people were looking for a little more comfort, and that this product was used. So that's the highlight feature is stone church just out of salt bridge.
Unknown Speaker 1:15
So it's quite a pretty picturesque church, but not good news when the cross fell down because of the rotting wood. So what what's what what is part of this restoration, what exactly is happening?
Unknown Speaker 1:28
It's actually probably threefold at the moment. The first thing, of course, is we want to get the cross back up. And when we wanted to put the cross back up, we discovered the cupola was in very bad repair. This is the little bell tower that holds the cross. And so it has to come off the roof, and is at the present moment is being restored. And the cross when it did come down broke into seven pieces. And because it's an old iron cross, it was quite a bit of a challenge to work at because you can't use the same processes that you would use on newer iron. However, the cross has been repaired and the cupola is in the process. And at the same time, we're doing a major training on our bail. And our bow is stamped 1887. Well, it's a great old bail. And it was wonderful to get it down on the ground. And when we did, we were able to put it on display with some a window and the cross. We have this display at the credit union on Salt Spring. And it was a very popular display because people realized this was a great opportunity to see the cross up cleaner and the bell up close.
Unknown Speaker 2:41
So like you're giving people a renewed appreciation for the church and some of its history. Well,
Unknown Speaker 2:46
this press like big personal goal is I think the history of the church. And it's such a significant part of Saltspring history, that it's a shame to not only let the church kind of politic its repair, but let the stories be lost as well. So as much as working on the structure of the church, we're trying to gather the history of the church, from people as well.
Unknown Speaker 3:10
And I guess the church tells a fair bit of history of the island. Now there's a cemetery there isn't a domestic industry
Unknown Speaker 3:17
or a cemetery right adjacent to the church. This cemetery has the earliest defaults by pioneers, the people that actually built the church. Many of them are interred in this cemetery, and as well. Any of the Hawaiians were involved in this. Hawaiians, Hawaiians Yes, the Hawaiians came to Salt Spring, because many of them worked with the Hudson's Bay Company, really, and they chose to settle here. One of the things I read was that in certain ways, it reminded them most of home. And they saw a fairly large number of them settled on Salt Spring, at least certainly still have descendants of this group of people. They refer to them as Connect. Wonderful history. And it's great that and we don't want to do that either. So,
Unknown Speaker 4:07
Emily, where are the fundraising efforts at I know, you know, construction, and it just anything to do with upkeeping of a building is not cheap. How are you doing financially for this? Well,
Unknown Speaker 4:18
one of the chromosomes actually fell off the roof a little over two years ago. And it has taken until now for us to get the initial funds to get the cross and a cupola down and do the repair on the cross, the cupola and the bail. And we are going to do this gradually as fun come in. So it's certainly going to be an ongoing thing. Ongoing fundraiser. We're looking for community support. We've had wonderful support from the local newspapers with pictures and articles. We've been advertising and we're relying on our community to help us preserve this important part of our history. So
Unknown Speaker 4:59
you're not simply relying on on church going up parishioners giving a donation on Sunday morning.
Unknown Speaker 5:04
No, that's not going to cut it for preserving this much history. Yeah.
Unknown Speaker 5:09
And as you say it's so significant for more than just the people who attend on Sunday morning. Oh, it's
Unknown Speaker 5:15
certainly a landmark on Salt Spring and has been for many, many years. Well,
Unknown Speaker 5:20
Emily, good luck as your fundraising effort continues. Thanks for taking our call this morning. Oh,
Unknown Speaker 5:24
you're very welcome. Good to talk to you. Okay, ma'am.
Unknown Speaker 5:27
Emily Hepburn is a member of the congregation at St. Paul's Church on Salt Spring Island. It is 758 this Thursday morning.
