St. Mary's Getting Ready to Celebrate 100 Years

St. Mary’s Parish was established on September 10, 1922 by Bishop Thomas O’Leary, Bishop of the Diocese of Springfield, who also on the same day named Fr. Thomas McKoan the first resident pastor for the town of Shrewsbury. St. Theresa’s Church on Main Street continued to be used as the parish church while the mission in the Lake Shore area was moved from the Palais Royal, first to a tent on the grounds behind St. Anne’s Cemetery and then to the old dye building across the street.

As the Catholic population was growing in both Shrewsbury Center and the Lake Quinsigamond area, Fr. McKoan faced a double problemSt. Theresa’s Church was not large enough to accommodate the Catholics in the center of town while the parishioners of the Lake District needed a church to be built. During his first year as pastor of the rapidly expanding parish, Fr. McKoan inaugurated the “twin church project”. Land was purchased on Summer Street and in the Spring of 1923 work was begun on the first St. Mary’s Church. In the Fall of that same year construction of St. Anne’s Church began on the land behind the cemetery where the “chapel tent” once stood. Both churches were designed by the same architect and built by the same contractors. In one year’s time Shrewsbury had two new Catholic churches.

They were dedicated on August 17, 1924 by Bishop Thomas O’LearySt. Mary’s in the
morning and St. Anne’s in the afternoon.