DUANE
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Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Austin Avenue Methodist Church. Now, some buildings just stand there. This one makes a statement.
Designed by R.H. Hunt, the Austin Avenue Methodist Church is a substantial interpretation of Gothic architecture, and that word, substantial, does a lot of work when you're standing in front of it. The structure is two stories equivalent, resting on a raised basement, and it anchors itself to the ground like it intends to be there for a good long while.
Right up top, there's a prominent bell tower, the kind that catches your eye before anything else does. It was built in 1925, during the ministry of the Reverend Cullom H. Booth, and whoever was in the congregation back then knew they were getting something worth showing up for.
Now, time has a way of editing even the finest work. That original tracery detail in the tower, the delicate stonework that Hunt had specified, was removed sometime by the 1940s. Gone.
You'd never know it was there unless someone told you. And then came 1954, when a fire caused extensive damage to the sanctuary. The original art glass windows, all that color and craft, and the tracery detail inside, all of it was replaced in the aftermath.
So what you see today is a building that has been tested, altered, and rebuilt in pieces, still standing in that Gothic spirit R.H. Hunt put down on paper, still wearing that bell tower like a crown. Some stories are about what endures.
Some are about what doesn't. This one, somehow, is both.
What the marker says
Designed by R.H. Hunt, this edifice is substantial interpretation of Gothic architecture. It was built in 1925 during the ministry of the Rev. Cullom H. Booth. The two-story-equivalent brick structure, which rests on a raised basement, features a prominent bell tower. The original tracery detail in the tower was removed by the 1940s. The original art glass windows and tracery detail in the sanctuary were replaced after a 1954 fire caused extensive damage.