Notre Dame de Lourdes Church (Fall River, Massachusetts)

 Roman Catholic church  Add category

The original church on this site was dedicated in 1906. The twin spires originally reached 310 feet above the ground, with views of the entire region; they were lowered to 235 feet after the Great New England Hurricane of 1938 (which matched the length of the church). The interior was columnless, and featured massive paintings on the ceiling by Ludovic Cremonini.

The 1,500 seat church was being renovated as part of its 75th anniversary celebration when, on May 11, 1982, a worker who was sautering the copper sheathing to the roof, lit the bone-dry rafters on fire. Efforts to stop it from spreading failed, and soon the entire church went up in one of the most spectacular conflagrations in the city's history. Blown by high winds, it took out several neighboring tenement houses to the south (there is a parking lot in this area now) before being contained, but not before the church was completely gutted.

It was rebuilt into the modern church shown below after several years of work, with one stained glass window (which was away for cleaning at the time) from the original church used in the building. Other than the model in the entryway, the only other remnants of the old church are the stone retainer wall around the property and the World War I Memorial, featuring Jesus standing above an angel holding a fallen soldier, which, despite being some thirty feet from the church, survived the inferno thanks to favorable winds.