Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in the City and Diocese of New York
The title of the post is the official name of Saint John the Divine, although it is teasingly referred to as Saint John the Unfinished. Designed in 1888 and begun in 1892, the structure was to be built in the customary cathedral shape--a cross--in the Byzantine-Romanesque style. Immediately, construction ran into difficulty trying to reach bedrock for a firm foundation. It was finally hit 72 feet below surface. Rather than change location, J.P.Morgan, a trustee of SJtD, donated a half million dollars to continue construction. In 1899, the first services were held in the crypt--the only part of the cathedral completed at that point--after an expenditure of $2 million dollars, a staggering amount of money in those days (I plugged in the numbers in an inflation converter, and the same would cost $51 BILLION today, if that can be right.)
(Illustration taken from Oprah.com. This is NOT Saint John the Divine, but it is very similar. SJtD has a much longer Nave and has seven Chapels behind the Apse. Not marked on the illustration is the Crossing, which is the square formed in the midst of the cross-shaped church between the Nave and the Choir.)
Four years later, eight massive granite columns--six feet in diameter, 55 feet high, and weighing 130 tons each--were placed in the Choir. The thought of something that large being transported and then hoisted into place boggles the mind, but, if I recall correctly, even more amazing is that one-third of each column was buried to keep them in place! While reading about the cathedral, I came across the blog of Chris Orcutt, a descendant of one of the men who quarried the granite. He includes a newspaper account of how one of the columns was nearly lost at sea in a storm. Regrettably, we never got to that end of the cathedral as there was a concert that day, and I wasn't able to photograph those massive columns.
Building Saint John the Divine was a slow, expensive task. Ten years after construction began, a tile dome was built for the Crossing. Intended to serve as a temporary roof, it was meant to be replaced at a later date with a spire.
There had been friction between the trustees and the original architectural firm. When the main architect died, it allowed SJtD to dismiss the firm and hire a Gothic revival architect. His zeal for Gothic had him determined to demolish anything of the Byzantine-Romanesque design and rebuild in his favored style. He reconstructed the Choir and Apse so that their vaulting would match the vaulting of the Nave. He intended to dismantle the dome over the Crossing and erect a massive Gothic tower in its place. That never came to be due to numerous situations, and Rafael Guastavino's tile dome still graces the Crossing as one of the largest free-standing domes in the world. Some obstacles are blessings; I rather like the hodgepodge that is Saint John the Divine.
By 1918, seven apsidal Chapels encircled the Choir. Each Chapel was dedicated to a specific immigrant group representing the workmen who had labored on the cathedral: Scandinavian, German, British, Eastern (African/Asian), French, Italian, and Spanish. Known as the "Chapels of the Tongues," the chapels represented the seven most prominent ethnic groups to first immigrate to New York City upon the opening of Ellis Island in 1892--the same year the Cathedral began construction.
A switch of architects, lack of money, and scarcity of skilled labor resulted in Saint John the Divine reflecting an assimilation of architectural styles, with a Gothic Nave; a Romanesque Crossing under the dome; Gothic Choir stalls; Chapels in Norman/Romanesque, French, English, Renaissance, and Spanish and English Gothic styles; and Roman arches and columns separating the high altar and ambulatory.
A change of Bishop brought renewed vigor into fundraising as he recruited Franklin D. Roosevelt's help. The building fund benefited from a campaign that tapped into the sports and entertainment stars of the day and raised millions of dollars. Even after the stock market crash of 1929, construction continued, providing employment for many during the Great Depression.
In 1932, the famous Great Rose Window was installed. With more than 10,000 pieces of colored glass, it is the largest stained glass window in the United States, measuring 40 feet in diameter. This is not a good photo of the window; shooting up from the floor, the Rose Window (top window) doesn't show as large as it really is. Look at the very center. That bit of red is the figure of Jesus. If I remember correctly (from a tour nine years ago!), Jesus is about six feet tall.
In 1941, the public was invited to the consecration of the finished Nave to see the full interior in all its glory. At 161 feet long, the popular saying was that the Nave was "two football fields, end to end, with room left for the football." It could comfortably seat 5,000 worshipers. The dome Crossing could hold the Statue of Liberty with her flame held high. Sadly, the eight-day celebration was cut short as Pearl Harbor occurred the following week, and all plans for further construction came to an abrupt halt. There is a spot, called the Pearl Harbor Arch, which was left incomplete when a stonecarver did not return to finish. With a lack of manpower to continue building and the the hardships of a nation at war, the Bishop at the time felt the church needed to divert building funds to works of charity. Construction ceased. In a somber 1942, the cathedral stood with a completed Nave, West Front, Baptistry, and part of the North Transept. All plans for further construction were set aside for decades.
More about Saint John the Divine to come...