Mon 12/7/2020 3:08 PM
Beth,
Pam and I tried to call the phone number, but it no longer works. Just so you can see where I got it from, the link is at the bottom of this email. I guess information never dies on the Internet. Lol.
I then tried to do some research on the Church and its cemetery (mostly using Wikipedia).
We will need access to the HS document to figure this out. The Church was founded just 17 years before John, Sr.’s death and internment. Without access to property records, ownership of the Church building and the cemetery is unknown. The story is fascinating so let me share it.
Cyril & Methodius Church in Lisbon Falls (founded in 1923) and Holy Family Church in Lisbon Falls (founded in 1888) joined together to form a new parish. Our Lady of the Rosary Parish was established in 1975 after the Dominicans, who cared for a mission church in Sabattus from 1905 to 1975, transferred it to Portland’s Diocese.
The former St. Cyril and St. Methodius Church is located in Lisbon Falls, at the southeast corner of Maine State Route 125 and High Street. It is a large rectangular brick building with a gabled roof. Squat square towers flank the front facade with buttress-style projecting pilasters at the corners. The facade center has a large Gothic arch, in which there are two entrances, each also set-in arches, with a circle-in-cross design above. Atop the large arch is a wagon-wheel rose window, and a cross crests the gable above.
St. Cyril and St. Methodius Church was designed in 1923 by Lewiston architects Gibbs & Pulsifer and are an imposing example of a neo-Gothic architecture for a relatively small community. The structure is one-storied of brick with a slate-covered gable roof. Square two-story towers flank the entrance. The main facade is dominated by a huge Gothic arch outlined in stone, which encloses double doors. It is also the only known church in Maine with an association to the Slovak immigrant community. It was dedicated in 1926 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977. It is presently home to the Maine Art Glass Studio.
The Slovak community in Lisbon Falls was formed in the 1890s when a group migrated from New Jersey searching for work at the Worumbo Mill and formed a tightly knit social group. Alienated from other well-established cultural groups, they formed their own Catholic organization and raised funds to build this church, completed in 1923. It was formally accepted into the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland in 1936. The building now houses a studio of glass artists.
I will have to be patient.
John, IV
