Historic Cape Breton stone church gets international boost

Response from across Canada and around the world has helped boost fundraising efforts to restore a historic stone church in Victoria Mines, N.S.

The Stone Church Restoration Society is about $5,000 shy of reaching the $40,000 needed to buy St. Alphonsus Church from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Antigonish. Money from outside the region will help push it over the top, says Melanie Sampson, volunteer president of the Stone Church Restoration Society.

For instance, a woman in Edmonton linked her birthday Monday with the church's fundraising campaign.

Edmonton woman asks for birthday donations

"It's her 47th birthday today so she would like to match any donations, donated just today until midnight, dollar for dollar up to $470 to celebrate her birthday and the stone church's 100th birthday," Sampson said.

The donor, who wants to remain anonymous, moved away from Cape Breton 20 years ago, but the stone church remains a big part of what she considers home, and its loss would be a blow to her.

"The church on this beautiful rolling hill, it is so beautiful ... I would be saddened every time I drove by," she said from her Edmonton home on Monday.

She said the church is big part of the local culture and comparedthe fundraising for the original church to the current effort, with people giving a few dollars here and a few dollars there.

"There was a lady who was a bootlegger that kicked in lots of money to build it. What I am contributing is a pittance compared to the work that is being put into this."

The community paid for most of the original stone church in the early 1900s. Much of it came from poor coal miners. The property includes a monument for the 65 men who died in a 1917 New Waterford mining disaster. Six of the lost were parishioners.

Support from U.S., Europe, Australia

The church's history and beauty has resonated far outside Cape Breton.

"We've heard from a couple from Yonkers, New York. We've had other donations from Australia, England and France, which is great," Sampson said.

"The church has become like a national treasure that everyone wants to save."

Also on Monday, a 73-year-old woman in High River, Alta., who grew up in the area, senta $73 donation "my age," she said, adding that the churchyard will one day be her resting place.

The restoration group plans to turn the former St. Alphonsus Church into a non-denominational wedding chapel and tourist attraction. Last weekend, it hosted its first wedding.