Polish Parishes and Churches in Michigan, Massachusetts and Minnesota, part II

In 1911 Harry J. Rill (born 1854) drew up plans for the current church and convent for the nuns. The construction was carried out by Józef Nowakowski.  The construction was completed in 1916. 

The interior decoration was purchased from the Daprato Statuary Company, and the same company made the stained-glass windows in 1918.

The history of the Church of St. Hyacinth is quite
similar to that of other parishes founded by Polish emigrants, this time mostly Kashubian. With a massive influx of immigrants the community of St. Albertus’s grew and the establishment of a new parish became an urgent necessity. The first Masses were held in Martin Tesmar’s house at the corner of McDougall and Theodore streets.

 The design was entrusted to the local architect John Donaldson, representing the Donaldson and Meier Company. The building differs from the ecclesiastical architecture of Detroit as it features Romanesque Revival elements within a Byzantine Revival structure, additionally enhanced by decoration referring to Byzantine art, e.g. made from mosaics.

The St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish in Bay City is one of the ten oldest Polish parishes in the United States, and was organized by Father Kazimierz Rochowski. The first church dedicated on 13 December 1874, was made of wood and could accommodate two hundred people.

The new church (constructed in the years 1889-1892) was designed by Pratt & Koeppe, the leading architectural company in Bay City in 1880-1910, and built by the companies run by Ben Burbrigde and Andrew Thompson. It was an imposing Gothic Revival structure, designed for 1500 people, with skeleton frame construction (steel, yellow brick, concrete, stone) and architectural details made from oak inside and brick outside.

In St. Florian’s facade great harmony of vertical and horizontal features is achieved by decorating the red brick structure with horizontal stripes made of lightcolored limestone. The construction technique which Cram used was very modern – a steel frame. The building is believed to have been awarded by the American Architect magazine in 1929.

The Church of St. Florian fits perfectly into the idea of architecture which goes beyond the more or less creative imitation of old styles. The designer was looking for the architecture that would emanate spirituality and resist the progressing industrialization, which distracted man from non-material values. The beauty of Gothic architecture and its inner harmony was to be the opposite of the ugliness and chaos of the industrial world.

The Polish parish of St. Florian in Hamtramck was established in 1907, at the beginning of the town’s prosperity. Its establishment was connected with the development of the automotive industry and the rapid growth of Polish immigration.

In 1916 the church and a Felician convent were erected. The designer was the dependable Harry J. Rill. Thanks to the archives that have been preserved we can learn a lot about the decoration process, which extended over several years. And when it ended the renovations and redecorations began. In 1920 the church obtained three bells named St. Stanislaus Kostka, Holy Angels and Our Lady Queen of Poland.

The new main altar was installed in 1942 and restored in 2020. In the 1950s the works included the new painting decoration made by the artist Józef C. Mazur from Buffalo, a stained-glass maker, painter and sculptor originating from Galicia. He was educated in the USA at the Albright Art School in Buffalo and at the Art Students League of New York.

The first European settlers arrived in what is now Chicopee in 1638. In the 19th century the city became an important textile industry center, to which Poles, emigrants from the poor areas of the Austrian partition (Galicia), began arriving in 1880. The Baroque Revival church accommodating more than 800 people was built between 1908 and 1909 according to the design by Robert J. Reiley and Gustav E. Steinback from New York.

The character of the interior is predominantly determined by paintings. In the semi-dome over the apse there is the icon of Our Lady of Czestochowa surrounded by angels. The vault over the nave features trompe l’oeil coffers and an image of St. Stanislaus floating among the clouds with angels holding the attributes of the bishop.

The Polish parish was established in Winona very early, in 1871, when a
hundred families from the Prussian partition had settled in the city. On 28 October 1894  there was a consecration of the cornerstone for the construction of a church. The new church was dedicated by Bishop Joseph B. Cotter a year later, on Thanksgiving Day. The church for nearly 2000 people was designed in the studio of Charles Grandison Maybury, which he ran in Winona between 1881 and 1904 together with his son Jefferson.