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Woodside – A long-lost piece of St Sebastian’s Church history has been returned to the church thanks to a local man who found it in his home and brought it to the rectory last month.
A precious trowel used in 1896 to lay the cornerstone of the original wooden version of St. Sebastian’s Church is now in the possession of the church — 126 years after it was first used.
“It was an unexpected gift to have him back,” said the church’s pastor, Patrick West. “This is their ceremonial form at that time. I don’t know who they would give it to after the ceremony.”
Donor Joseph Eaton found the gilded trowel in his basement while cleaning out his house in preparation for a move to the Hamptons.
“At first I didn’t know what it was,” he recalls. “I had to get out a magnifying glass to read the engravings on it.”
Both Eaton and his sister Ann Carstensen grew up in the house, which had been in their family since 1910, before it was finally sold.
“Once we understood what it meant, we knew what we had to do,” he said.
“We thought it belonged to the church and it should go back to the church,” Carstensen added.
According to Father West, Eaton “went into the rectory with him and offered to give him there to the church.”
Möltur’s carvings tell quite a story. One side is a picture of a cross. On the second page: “This trowel was laid on March 15, 1896, at the foundation stone of St. Sebastian’s Church, Woodside, by Rev. S.E. “Used by McDonnell.”
“Rev. CE McDonnell” is the second bishop in the history of the Diocese of Brooklyn, Bishop Charles E. Reference to McDonnell. Malacca is also inscribed with the name of Rev. E.M. Gannon, the first pastor of St. Sebastian’s Church.
Father West explained that since the church was built two years before the consolidation of New York, Woodside was located on Long Island, not New York.
St. Sebastian’s Church was founded in 1894, but the church was not built until two years later. The original log church building was located on Woodside Ave. In 1926, a brick church building was built in its place.
Malacca is not the only interesting aspect of the history of St. Sebastian’s Church.
The church is the only church in the Diocese of Brooklyn that is located in a converted movie theater, and it still has some of that theater’s features, including a long, sloping floor. Due to its origins as a cinema, it is one of the churches without stained glass windows.
In 1955, the church purchased the old Loew’s Woodside Theater, which opened in 1926 on Roosevelt Avenue. The acquisition came after the US Supreme Court ruled that movie studios had an unfair monopoly because they owned both studios and theaters. The Supreme Court ruling forced the studios, including RKO, owner of Loew’s Woodside Theater, to sell their properties.
For now, the West Father is keeping the mala in the rectory for safekeeping. He plans to make a plexiglass case to display it.
He has used the trowel several times since it was handed over to the church last month. “One person died. He was a very active person in the church, so I brought him to the wake. I mentioned how churches are built with bricks. But faith communities of churches are built with the hard work of volunteers,” he said.
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