{"id":801,"date":"2013-05-06T10:10:45","date_gmt":"2013-05-06T16:10:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacing.ca\/edmonton\/?p=801"},"modified":"2013-05-06T20:54:27","modified_gmt":"2013-05-07T02:54:27","slug":"church-street-edmontons-sacred-heritage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/edmonton\/2013\/05\/06\/church-street-edmontons-sacred-heritage\/","title":{"rendered":"Church Street – Edmonton’s Sacred Heritage"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week Edmonton City Council received a report detailing plans for Church Street- a small corridor within the McCauley neighbourhood up for municipal heritage designation. This report to Council is the result of a special planning study by the Urban Design Unit at the City of Edmonton and the acknowledgement of the significant heritage value of the street in a recent planning study\u00a0 – The McCauley Alberta Avenue Historic Resources Inventory<\/a> prepared by Urban Systems.<\/p>\n

The report contains several recommendations for both long-term and short-term projects brought forward from numerous consultations with the community<\/a>. \u00a0These projects offer a tremendous diversity of ideas to help bring the street back from a period of decline.\u00a0 The ideas include a Christmas Festival, new street lighting, community art projects and a proposed a multicultural teahouse.\u00a0 Foremost among all of the plans is the willingness to celebrate the neighbourhood\u2019s historical significance.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
View of McCauley Neighbourhood and 96 Street c. 1960
City of Edmonton Archives<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Church Street (seen here in the 1960’s) boasts an unusually high density of purpose-built Christian Churches – a total of 13 neighbourhood congregations. These parishes are architecturally, historically and culturally significant as testaments of role of spiritual life in creating a sense of place at the northern frontier.\u00a0 As a collection, they represent the successful co-habitation of an astonishing diversity of religions, ethnic and cultural groups as well as their evolving presence in Edmonton. \u00a0Church street offers a unique example of a linear clustering of small neighbourhood parishes.<\/p>\n

The clustering of neighbourhood parishes although not uncommon is virtually unseen before in Canada in this scale and formation. \u00a0Almost all the churches were built and re-built over a period of approximately 20 years at the turn of the twentieth century.\u00a0 Given the limited availability of resources, they were originally built modestly according to a standard timber-frame model, a front-facing gable roof with milled wood siding.\u00a0 They demonstrate minimal detailing and sometimes exhibit gothic arched windows.<\/p>\n

96 Street (formerly Kinistino Street), and now to be officially renamed \u2018Church Street\u2019, was the street of choice for small neighbourhoood congregations in Edmonton as it was ideally located between the busy Namayo Street (now known as 97 Street\/Chinatown) and the McCaluley residential neighbourhood.\u00a0 According to the to the City archives, the first congregation to locate on the street were the French Roman Catholics at the Immacul\u00e9e Conception, the sister parish of the earlier St. Joachim which was re-built from its original site at Fort Edmonton.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A view of St. Paul’s Anglican Church in McCauley before it was rebuilt of brick and renamed St. Stephen’s Anglican Church.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By the end of construction of the Immacul\u00e9e Conception in 1905, two other congregations would be located on the street: the Grace Methodist (now The Family Worship Church) at 106A and the St. Paul\u2019s Anglican Church (formerly St. Stephens\u2019s and now an Architectural Office) on 109.\u00a0\u00a0 The Catholics, Lutheran and the Orthodox groups grew tremendously over the next 10 years to hold many different language services under a single roof.\u00a0 In the case of the Immacul\u00e9e Conception, the congregation expanded to accommodate the Irish, Italian and Ruthenian Catholics groups, all of which held services at one point or another in the small Church.<\/p>\n

Early depictions of the Immacul\u00e9e Conception show a Ruthenian Catholic wood-frame church built at the back end of the property.\u00a0 This small Ruthenian Catholic Church would become St. Josaphat\u2019s Basilica, now a Provincially Recognized Heritage Site.\u00a0 Across the street, there is Sacred Heart, the Irish Catholic Church also born from Immacul\u00e9e Conception and now a First Nation Catholic Church with a variety of cultural and faith-based social services.\u00a0 Further down the Street is St. Barbara\u2019s Orthodox Church, also a Provincial Heritage Site and historically associated with the Canadian Holy Trinity Orthodox Church, a breakaway from the Moscow Patriarch located across the street from St. Paul\u2019s Anglican Parish on 109.\u00a0 The Holy Trinity Orthodox Church occupies what was Edmonton\u2019s first Seventh Day Adventist Church built in the 1920\u2019s in a modest interpretation of the American Federal Style.\u00a0 Today the French Immacul\u00e9e Conception itself is known as Mary Queen of the Martyrs, a Vietnamese Catholic Church.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A view of Edmonton’s First Seventh Day Adventist Church now Holy Trinity Canadian Orthodox Church<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Over the years some of the neighbourhood parishes have individually gained either Provincial or Municipal recognition.\u00a0 The history from the standpoint of the neighbourhood reveals the tremendous inter-woven history of these congregations. \u00a0\u00a0The congregations have similar historical and cultural narratives that continue to evolve with the changing needs of McCauley.\u00a0 \u00a0Almost all of the original wood-frame gable roof structures were re-built to reflect particular architectural styles, traditions and aspirations of their congregations.<\/p>\n

Edmonton\u2019s Historical Board<\/a> has recognised the street as a \u2018historical resource\u2019 and has placed all of the Churches within the proposed \u2018heritage area boundary\u2019 on Edmonton\u2019s Inventory of Historical Resources<\/a> where they will potentially qualify for restoration grants and municipal protection. \u00a0Council has also committed $500 000 to short term upgrades.<\/p>\n

\"View<\/a>
View of Proposed Heritage Area and Heritage Properties Adapted from the City of Edmonton’s McCauley Open House. Religious buildings are indicated in red.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The area boasts tremendous cultural narrative, and it is only a matter of time before Provincial and National recognition ensues as later on this month, Church Street will be thematic focus of a national architectural conference.\u00a0 The Society for the Study of Architecture in Canada<\/a>, a group that has built up expertise in evaluating the significance of sacred space and intuitions in the development of Canadian cities, will be hosting its annual conference in Edmonton from May 28th<\/sup>– June 1st<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

In light of this important event, Spacing Edmonton will produce a unique series on the pioneering history of its early congregations along 96 Street.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The series will cover the social, cultural and architectural features of these institutions and highlight their contribution to the City\u2019s cultural development.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week Edmonton City Council received a report detailing plans for Church Street- a small corridor within the McCauley neighbourhood up for municipal heritage designation. This report to Council is the result of a special planning study by the Urban Design Unit at the City of Edmonton and the acknowledgement of the significant heritage valueContinue reading “Church Street – Edmonton’s Sacred Heritage”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8154,"featured_media":808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8,15,20,29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-architecture","category-curiosities","category-history","category-neighbourhoods","category-urban-design"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nChurch Street - Edmonton's Sacred Heritage - Spacing Edmonton<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/edmonton\/2013\/05\/06\/church-street-edmontons-sacred-heritage\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jennifer Laforest\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/edmonton\/2013\/05\/06\/church-street-edmontons-sacred-heritage\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/edmonton\/2013\/05\/06\/church-street-edmontons-sacred-heritage\/\",\"name\":\"Church Street - 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