The new church building!

As previously mentioned the parish had, through much hard work, managed to acquire a former Lutheran church that was for sale on South Goodman Street. It was a handsome stone building constructed in the 1920s, when the neighborhood was a strongly German enclave.Naturally, being a Lutheran church, it had a certain style and layout, which differed of course from that found in Orthodox sanctuaries.

The walls were bare of icons, there was no iconostasis, none of the furnishings associated with Orthodox worship. Shown here is a photo of that space in early 1967, with Father Warnecke of Syracuse celebrating the liturgy.

For those familar with today's space it is startling to see what it once looked like. The platform in the front was much larger, with a small choir loft on the left as one faced the altar area. There were no icons on the walls as yet, only a stained glass image seen in the center high on the wall. (This was removed and an icon of the Theotokos done by a parishoner named James McKean was mounted in that space. George Kuyon was one of the men who hung the icon and recalls how tricky it was to hang  and center it while balancing on extension ladders!)