Our unofficial church historian, Cathy Corder, has unearthed some fascinating documents from the early days of St. Stephen. Most interesting are those that detail the process our predecessor church, Broadway Presbyterian, went through in deciding to move from its location across from present Broadway Baptist to this site.
Broadway’s pastor in the ‘forties, was James F. Hardie. It was under his leadership, and the leadership of a visionary session, that Broadway acquired this property in May of 1944. The impetus was need. Broadway’s old building was only 25 years old, but already it was showing serious wear-and-tear. And it was far too small for the numbers that were attending. Sunday schools classes took place in every corner, including the pastor’s study, and a dilapidated building that many considered a health threat. That part of town, devastated by the Fort Worth fire of 1909, had never seen the growth people had imagined; but a survey of church members indicated that many lived on this side of town.Fort Worth Itself was a growing metropolis, but Broadway was landlocked, unable to acquire more property in its area. It was time to move.
It was Dr. Hardie and Broadway’s session that conceived the notion of a Gothic-style Presbyterian cathedral on a hill. The earliest plans for what would become our present sanctuary were first drawn in those years. Dr. Hardie broke the ground for the new building on Feb. 22, 1948. The first building on the site was the Boy Scout Hut. I think you need to be ready for this: The full name of the Boy Scout Hut is “The Harry R. Male Boy Scout Lodge,” after one of Troop 17’s founding leaders.
The new sanctuary and building—the present Parish Hall andEducationBuilding—held their first worship service June 4, 1950. By then, Dr. Hardie had resigned, and the new pastor, a certain Rev. R. W. Jablonowski, had been installed. But “The Final Report of Building Committee to the Congregation of St. Stephen Presbyterian Church” in October, 1950, concludes with Dr. Hardie’s words written in 1944. In retrospect, they are prophetic, and furthermore apply as much to our present capital campaign as they did then:
“As I have thought these last few weeks of the long and stately step which Broadway is contemplating, the words of the Psalmist have been in my mind: ‘This is the day which the Lord hath made: we will rejoice and be glad in it.’ I rejoice in the vision of our officers, who are willing to compliment us by planning great things for us, as servants of the King. They are thinking of us; of the newcomers who are crowding into our City; of the entire City of Fort Worth, and above all, of the generations which are to follow us. They are planning for the religious life of their children, and of their children’s children. I rejoice in their spirit of daring, and am comforted in the thought that our people, following their leadership, are capable yet of manifesting the spirit of the pioneers who built such lasting monuments of their best selves, in the generation which was theirs. We must not do less than they, but being heirs of such a past, and of such a heritage, we must go in their spirit, to yet greater things.
“Fort Worth needs what our leaders are planning, and in the days to come, our reward will be those whose spiritual lives have been deepened and enriched, who are rising up to call us blessed. ‘Thy people shall be willing in the day of Thy power.’ The Lord is trying to do something grand through us… Let us hear again the words of Nehemiah: ‘The God of Heaven, He will prosper us: therefore we His servants arise and build.’”