OLD ST. VINCENT'S CHURCH SEEKS ARTIFACTS FOR NEW MUSEUM

The 142-year-old Old St. Vincent's Church has a place in many hearts.

For B.W. Harrison, a non-Catholic who was married in the church in 1947, that translates into carrying on the work of his late wife, Hazel, who worked toward the restoration that was completed shortly before she died in 1990.

Those with similar associations now are being asked to contribute artifacts and photographs to a museum that will illuminate the church's history.

Harrison and others will be at the church today from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. to accept donations of items that could be displayed when the new museum is opened in two or three months.

"We thought since everybody refers to it as Old St. Vincent's Church and we have a lot of out-of-town visitors, we should have a museum," said Harrison, a member of the church's board of directors.

James Parker, retired founder of the University Museum, and current director Pat Reagan-Woodard both have volunteered help.

The museum will be in the back where the confessionals once stood. Glass cases already are in place.

As a religious institution, the church's history dates to the laying of a cornerstone at the Main Street site in 1838. That original stone structure was leveled by a tornado. The present building is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The church now is a religious and cultural center designated as a Church of Ease, which means it is not a parish church with an assigned pastor.

One of the artifacts already donated to the museum is a sick call kit believed to be more than 100 years old. The carved wooden box containing a crucifix and candleholders was used by the priest when he visited the infirm.

The museum also will showcase some of the original gargoyles from the church altar. Harrison, a retired University of Missouri extension administrator, said structural material such as bricks, candleholders, almost anything associated with the church's past will be considered for display.

Many artifacts are known to be scattered about the community. Parishioners sometimes were given religious items as altars were rearranged through the years.

"Often they just put them out and said whoever wants them can have them," said Loretta Schneider, president of the People of Old St. Vincent's, the organization that spearheaded the restoration.

"We feel there are some of those kinds of things out in the community."

Because of its relationship with the now-closed St. Vincent's Seminary, Old St. Vincent's was a parish church unlike others with their carefully kept records, Schneider says.

But she notes that the descendants of the families who founded the church have a reunion every other year. About the 500 people attended the most recent event.

Explaining his feelings for the church, Harrison recalls that it was destined for the headache ball back when the diocese decided to separate the city's two Catholic churches geographically in the 1960s. His wife was one who refused to allow that to happened, he said.

"She was one of the 30 members who said, "You're not going to tear this church down."