Repairs complete on historic church towers / LJWorld.com

Archive for Saturday, June 2, 2007

June 2, 2007

Plymouth Congregational Church, 925 Vt., recently completed repairs on the brick towers that sit atop its historic building. A ceremony will be at 10:30 a.m. Sunday.

It's funny the things you learn when a microburst knocks down part of your church, a construction worker gets stranded at the top, and then you knock down part of the church only to rebuild it.

You learn, for instance, that a portion of the building's beloved, historic facade actually was meant to be part of a toilet bowl.

That's the way it was at Plymouth Congregational Church, 925 Vt., which last week ended a 14-month ordeal by finishing repairs and construction on the brick towers that sit atop the church.

It all started in March 2006, when a microburst toppled one of the towers on the 127-year-old building.

Then, in April, crews were filling all eight towers with grout to strengthen them when one of the towers became unstable and began to fall. A worker was stranded briefly at the top, and the tower eventually had to be knocked down and reconstructed.

That wasn't the only surprise during the process. The church discovered that one of the majestic white caps on top of a tower was, in fact, a float intended for a toilet bowl, which had been painted white to match the other caps.

Now all of those caps have been replaced, and the cost of the repairs has been covered by insurance and a previous capital campaign intended for church reconstruction.

"I think we all took a great big sigh of relief after we finished getting all this done," says Tom Brown, a church member who helped oversee the project.

On Sunday, the church will pause for a brief ceremony at 10:30 a.m. to celebrate the newly completed towers.

"As my wife says, 'You finally got the jewelry put back on the old gal,'" Brown says.