There were two large Presbyterian churches around the corner from each other in Bellevue, both called Bellevue Presbyterian. The other one was the United Presbyterian congregation, and old Pa Pitt will pause for a moment to let the laugh track do its job. The church we see here was later called Northminster Presbyterian, and it is now home to the New Life Community Church.
Of course, in the glory days of steel and coal, the building was not quite so pale, as we see in this old postcard:
Although we don’t find it listed among his works, Father Pitt suspects that this school may have been designed by John T. Comès. The polychrome brickwork and crenellations remind us of some of his more famous churches, and the fact that the parish hired his disciple Leo McMullen to design the main church after Comès was dead may be suggestive. If anyone at the parish knows who designed this building, Father Pitt would greatly appreciate a comment.
Obviously the parish was getting ready for a festival when old Pa Pitt stopped by a few weeks ago.
This elaborately stony Gothic church is small but rich; it seems to represent an American Christian’s fantasy of the Middle Ages. It is no longer active as a church, but the building is kept in good shape by the current occupants, “The Center of Bellevue.” The gargoyles on the tower are distinctive and impressive.
This was the Methodist Protestant church, as the inscription informs us. Bellevue’s Methodist Episcopal congregation built just across the border in West Bellevue, now Avalon, where the congregation still meets in what has become known as the Greenstone Church.
Here is a little Arts-and-Crafts Romanesque church that had money at the wrong time. The modern addition (probably 1960s or early 1970s) is not sympathetic to the church behind it. The elaborate modernist window in the front probably replaced an earlier decorative window; perhaps the church had a fire. If a member of the congregation has any information, old Pa Pitt would be grateful for it.
The drama of salvation plays out in glass in the Church of the Assumption, with each pair of windows illustrating events from the Old and New Testaments related by a common theme. We have only a few of the windows here; it would be worth spending an hour or two to examine all of them. Above left: King Achab sends Micheas to prison; the Agony in the Garden; King Joram rejects the prophecy of Eliseus. Above right: Abner is slain treacherously by Joab; Judas betrays Christ with a kiss; Tryphon deceives Jonathan with gifts.
Left: Joseph is sold by his brethren; Judas conspires with the priest and magistrates; Absalom entices the men of Israel. Right: Melchisedech meets Abram; the Last Supper; the manna from heaven.
Left: Esau sells his birthright to Jacob; the Temptation of Christ; the tempting of Adam and Eve. Right: Moses heals Miriam; Mary Magdalene at the feet of Christ; the repentance of David.
Left: Enoch is borne to heaven; the Ascension; Elias is raised into heaven. Right: Moses receives the tables of the Law; the descent of the Holy Ghost as fire from heaven; the sacrifice of Elias.
To enter the Church of the Assumption, you pass through an arch held up by Adam and Eve just after the Fall.
The grotesque brackets along the sides of the Church of the Assumption run in a repeating series that seems to illustrate various stages of carving.
The gargoyles on the Church of the Assumption capture the true medieval spirit of inspired grotesquerie and goofiness and filter it through a twentieth-century sensibility. This gargoyle is having a bad day.
This one on the side of the building seems to be above a chimney vent. It demonstrates, in a silly way that would have appealed to the medieval sense of humor, one of the torments prepared for the damned.
Looking toward the altar, which is emphasized by a baldacchino and the glorious mural of the Assumption of Mary.
The communion rail, the pulpit, the baldacchino, and many other furnishings are carved from rich peachy marble.
The narthex is not neglected: look at that rich wood ceiling.
Leo McMullen, a disciple of the great John T. Comès, put his own unique Art Deco spin on traditional Romanesque architecture to give us a remarkably successful melding of medieval and modern sensibilities. McMullen was a native of Bellevue, and it looks as though he decided to put his hometown on the map by giving it a church that would be the envy of any city in the world. He succeeded.
Father Pitt took so many pictures of this glorious church that he is forced to split them up into multiple articles. And even with dozens of pictures, he has hardly begun to catalogue the artistic treasures to be found here. If you appreciate architecture, stained glass, painting, and sculpture, you owe yourself a visit to the Church of the Assumption.
Many more pictures to come.
