In 1904, the Pastor of St. Bernard Church in Concord came to Lincoln by bicycle. He met with 80 people to discuss establishing a church in Lincoln as a mission church of St.
Bernard Parish in Concord. Permission to build St. Joseph Church was granted, and the cornerstone of the church was laid in October, 1904. The church was built on the foundation of an existing house, and designed by Chickering and O’Connell Architects of Boston.
St. Joseph’s was enlarged in the summer of 1927 by the addition of 15 pews and a choir loft. This increased the seating capacity to 200, rearranged the locations of several of the original windows, and added five new windows.
In March, 1987, there was a fire in the church which burned the sanctuary and damaged the crucifix. Design and Building Committees were formed to renovate the church according to the new liturgical reforms of Vatican II. The church was closed for much of the 1991-1992 year, and was reopened for worship on Easter, 1992. The renovation was designed by Dennis Keefe of Keefe Associates.
Stained Glass Windows
The original church had 15 stained glass windows. Unfortunately, the name of the artist who created them was not recorded. There is speculation that, as was common in that day, the windows were ordered from a factory in Ireland, where they were customized according to selections from a catalog. In the 1991 renovation one new window was added to the church. The concept for this window was designed by St. Joseph Pastor Lawrence Drennan.
In 2004 Ann Janes organized historical information about each of the windows of St. Joseph Church. This guide can be downloaded here. Although compressed it is still a large file so it will take a little time to load.
Stations of the Cross
It is thought that the Stations of the Cross were hand crafted by one of the early pastors of St. Joseph Church. View images of the Stations here.
