LOOKING BACK is a Leader online feature that highlights historic photos. Readers are invited to submit their historic Jefferson County photos for online publication.
George Coleman of Herculaneum, a history buff who likes to restore and colorize old photographs, dropped this postcard off of the early days of Assumption Catholic Church in Herculaneum.
Coleman said he doesn’t know how he came across this postcard, but figured it probably belonged to his late mother, Ethel Coleman, who likely got it from her mother, Cecilia (Bone) Hampton.
He said the postcard doesn’t have any writing on the back of the postcard, which shows the church in the late stages of construction, except for a date, May 1917.
Coleman doesn’t figure that date coincides with the exact time the photo was taken because of the traces of snow in the photo.
The history of the church in the Herculaneum Bicentennial book notes that the early history of the parish is sketchy, and it doesn’t note when the building was complete.
The history does note that the first Communion class was held on May 27, 1917, with 14 boys and 14 girls participating.
While we don’t know whether Ethel was in that class, her son notes that his mother closely identified herself with the church throughout her life.
“She couldn’t have been baptized at the church, but she went to the church as soon as it was complete,” he said. “She went there her whole life, except for the last couple of years before she died, when she couldn’t. She had someone bring her Communion.”
Ethel Coleman died in November 2012 at the age of 93.
The history notes that the Catholic Church saw the need for a presence in Herculaneum, Pevely and surrounding areas and organized the Assumption parish in 1916. The building was built in 1917, the history notes, but while it was under construction, it’s possible that baptisms, marriages and funerals were held at Sacred Heart Church in Crystal City.
During the 1960s, the church was renovated, and the main entrance to the church was moved from the south end to the north end. Presumably, that’s the time that the staircase in the front on Station Street was removed.
--Steve Taylor
Send submissions (or if you have any information on this photo) to LOOKING BACK to nvrweakly@aol.com or bring or mail them to the Leader office, 503 N. Second St., Festus (P.O. Box 159, 63028). Please include your name, phone number, a brief description of what’s in the photo and tell us how you came by it. Please also include when it was taken, where and by whom (if known). A new LOOKING BACK photo will be posted each week.
