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SHEFFIELD – For the past couple of months, we have kept track of the dismantling of one of the oldest and most historic buildings in The Shoals – The former Grace Episcopal Church. Having fallen into harder times in recent decades, the old building, structurally unsound, is quickly being transformed from a former house of worship into a ruin.
The next step is demolition. All there will be left of Grace Church are memories… and photographs.
Here are a few that Sheri and Steve Wiggins took in the several weeks prior to the demolition.
8 comments
Great picture, sad story.
Just to be clear, Grace Episcopal Church hasn’t ceased to exist – it is simply no longer at this building, correct? The photographs don’t look like the Grace Church I visited for Christmas Eve service last year.
Grace still exists. Just in a different location.
This is one of the Buildings I always point out to people on my self appointed Historical Tour! Why tear down this piece of History? Why in the world didn’t Grace Episcopal help turn this into an Archives or Museum? It would be perfect and the right location…
Marilyn, we found out that the estimate for restoring the structure could approach a million dollars. It is in really terrible shape. The masonry walls form a trapezoid, for example, and there are man-size holes in the roof.
I meet with my Boy Scout troop at this church, David Luff’s father was Scoutmaster and I learned how to be a good scout in that church. So sorry to see it go. It will live on in my memory and those of us who meet there. To many names to list.
That was Troop 82, I believe. And we in Troop 62 met across the street in the Methodist church. And some warm nights the two troops would play capture-the-flag across the other street on the city hall lawn.
Sorry to see that beautiful old church go.
Please tell me someone rescued the stained glass!