The Roman Catholic population of the Village of Waterdown has been served by a number of different churches during the past one hundred and sixty years. The two earliest churches have both been demolished, the third one, located at the corner of Flamboro and Barton Streets has now closed and in 2005, a fourth church, built to serve the needs of a rapidly expanding parish was opened on the outskirts of the village.
By 1846, Catholic pioneers had settled in the Waterdown area in sufficient numbers that a small wooden church was constructed. It is believed that the original church bore the name of St. Francis, but it was changed to that of St. Thomas the Apostle within a year of its construction. Prior to this, during the first half of the nineteenth century, the needs of the residents were served by priests stationed at Oakville and Dundas. Mass was celebrated in private homes by circuit or itinerant priests, probably from the Society of Jesus, and special occasions, such as marriages and baptisms, were cause for a journey to the church at Oakville.
The land on which the first two churches were built, Lot 8, Concession 3, East Flamborough Township, was purchased by Thomas English, an early settler from Barnard Castle in the county of Durham, England. A successful mill builder, he had originally located in Nelson Township, but moved to Waterdown during the early 1840s, as development along the Grindstone Creek attracted new entrepreneurs. On 10 June 1852, he officially donated part of Lot 8 to the Catholic Diocese of Toronto, the deed stating that:
“…his successors forever upon trust to hold the same forever hereafter for the use of a church and burying ground for the members of the church of Rome residing within the said Diocese and to no other interest or purpose whatsoever.”
Within a few years, the frame building appears to have been replaced by a more permanent structure, a stone church, which served the congregation until the building of the third church was completed in 1915. The new stone church was officially blessed and dedicated by Red. Father O’Dwyer on 16 Jun 1864. In the ‘County of Wentworth and Hamilton City Directory for 1865-66’, the Waterdown entry lists all the churches in the village and notes,
“…the Roman Catholic Church was erected in 1850, of stone, and cost about $1,200 and capable of seating 500 persons.”
Even thought there was a church to serve the needs of the people in the village and surrounding area, there was no permanent minister. The church was attended by priests from larger parishes – from c. 1856 until 1877, the little church was under the care of St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church in Hamilton. Entries in local Directories during the 1860s state that priests came from both Hamilton and Oakville to offer the Liturgy and care for the residents of the area, as Waterdown had no permanent priest and services were held every two weeks by missionaries.
In 1877, the village of Freelton in West Flamborough Township was chosen to have a resident priest because it had a greater concentration of Catholic families and Waterdown was transferred to be under its control as a mission church, and remained thus until 1950 when it was awarded parish status. The first priest to serve the joint parish was Rev. William Lillis who prepared a report concerning the activities of the parish during 1879, mentioning Waterdown as having about twenty-eight families where he administered the Sacraments, that there was no debt on the cemetery, but the receipts were very scanty.
The little church must have been a bleak and uninviting place during the winter months as there was no electricity or running water. The first man to arrive at the church on Sunday morning assumed the responsibility for lighting the wood stove at the rear of the building, but reputedly the building never did get warm enough for most of the congregation. On very dark days, a number of kerosene lamps were lit to assist the congregation in following the service, although they reputedly were a source of great distraction to the younger members who insisted on counting out loud the number of times the old lamps backfired. Winter weather occasionally caused services to be cancelled, as the priest has a journey of close to ten miles to travel to reach the village to celebrate Mass. Since many in the congregation also travelled some distance to attend services, the Benediction was always given immediately after Mass and the sacred vessels used in the service were taken for safe keeping to the home of a parishioner.
After Mass, it became a tradition for the priest to visit the home of a parishioner and have dinner with the family before returning by horse and buggy to Freelton. During the ministry of Father Becker (1909-1924), he used to pick up the Baptist Minister who also lived in Freelton and bring him to his church in Waterdown.
During the tenure of Rev. William Becker (1909-1924), the third Waterdown church, a brick structure, was begun in 1914 and finished in 1915. The cornerstone was laid by his Excellency Bishop Dowling in 1914, and the dedication of the building a year later was a grand occasion with a gathering of both church and civic dignitaries. With the completion of the new church, the old one on the outskirts of the village for all practical purposes was abandoned and slowly fell into disuse and in 1937, the company of Fred Carson and Sons demolished it, leaving an open area within the cemetery as the only visible evidence of the early church.
© The Waterdown-East Flamborough Heritage Society 2008, 2024.
