High winds bring bad news to school building linked to Hydraulics

The neglected Sacred Heart School, located at Emslie Street and San Domingo Alley and designed by architects Schmill & Gould in 1913, is a victim of the high winds from yesterday's storm, which contributed to the collapse of its brick, northern-facing wall onto an adjacent lot earlier this morning.

 

The building is part of a church complex that once housed the German congregation of the Church of the Sacred Heart, founded in 1875 in the Hydraulics and moved in 1915 to this site, proximate to Clinton Street only a few blocks north of the Hydraulics neighborhood. The construction of the 1915 complex was underwritten by the Larkin Company, which purchased the congregation's original Seneca Street buildings, then adjacent to the Larkin Administration Building, to make way for future plant expansion. In the early 1980s, the Buffalo Diocese closed the Emslie Street complex in the church's first region-wide deaccessioning, commencing its spiral of decline.

The church's school building, a handsome load-bearing brick structure with a classic 1910s-era parapet, is now in the late (and possibly final) stage of "demolition by neglect." Its owners, the Witness Cathedral Church of God in Christ, reportedly abandoned the complex a year ago, suspending church services in the late summer of 2007. According to an official at Buffalo's Department of Permit & Inspection Services, a demolition permit for the school building was issued one month ago, part of a housing court case dating to 2001. This morning's partial collapse of the school building facade, imperiling the life and safety of neighbors and pedestrians nearby, adds another frustrating chapter to the ongoing deterioration of the historic church complex.

It is uncertain what, if anything, the current owners intend to do to secure the landmark buidling or mitigate the danger it now poses to the public. Nothing, perhaps - which means you the taxpayer may be left with the tab. What is certain is the demise of the school building, beginning with the callous disposition of the church complex in the early 1980s, was preventable.

Comments

[MJ]

One had to know this was coming. The faults in the brick work have been visible for years. This exposes deficincies in multiple systems.

[RaChaCha]

I agree - you can see the deterioration on Google Street View, the photography for which was done a year ago, I believe.

Being a distance runner, I get to experience the weather up-close-and-personal year round, and after being out in Sunday's weather I knew there would be bricks shed somewhere - unfortunate that it was this building.

I'd love to see the Diocese create a trust fund which could be tapped for preservation work on their former churches.

[Black Rocker]

The catholic diocese has a very poor record disposing of surplus buildings. It is sad to see many properties left to deteriorate because the church refuses to allow re-use that is not consistent with their ideology.

[Rick Herrmann]

does anyone know the early history of this church ?