Diamond Jubilee History
By M. M. Howard Miller, Originally published in the 75th Anniversary booklet in 1990
Page: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7
Saint Brendan Church is dedicated to Almighty God under the title of St. Brendan, a Sixth Century Irish explorer and builder of monasteries. Some historians contend that Saint Brendan led a party of monks to the shores of North America nearly 1000 years before the voyages of Columbus, and sailed in ahead of the Vikings!
In the year 1915, Vicar General Monsignor John Harnett of the Diocese of Monterey-Los Angeles showed a young Irish priest the map of Los Angeles, with the outline of the Diocese superimposed.
Father William Forde was appointed the first pastor. He had neither a place to live or a church in which to offer daily Mass. He was to visit the area, canvass it for parishioners, and make plans. Many of his parishionersto-be were already known to have big Irish and Italian families. The Bishop thought it would be well to start with a school and a temporary church. For the Irish who had suffered a tatal countermanding of education under the yoke of the English, learning was second only to the teaching of Faith as a vital necessity.
The school, to be staffed by the Sisters of the Immaculate
Heart of Mary was erected with its entrance on Western
Avenue—North
of Third Street. There was a handsome brick facade, spacious,
sunny classrooms, a large entry hall, high ceilings, and a
grand divided staircase to the second floor. On the West side
was a room extending the whole length of the school, with a
vaulted ceiling. There was a tall golden cross on the end of
the peaked roof facing toward 3rd Street. This was the first
church of St. Brendan. Adjacent were the priests' and sisters'
houses. The church was visible for a half mile or so, because
the parish owned the entire square block bounded by Second
and Third, and Western and Manhattan, and there were few nearby
buildings. The entire parish was predominantly residential,
except for a few stores on Western.
The boundaries set for the new parish are interesting in view of the tremendous growth of Los Angeles in later decades. On the North, the boundary was Clinton Street; on the West, the Western City limits; on the South,5th Street; on the East, the "gully" probably known today as Vermont Street. These boundaries existed until 1927, by which time many other parishes had winnowed it down to Beverly Boulevard, to Western Avenue, Rossmore Avenue and Wilshire Boulevard.
Father Forde was greatly dismayed when his parish was cut off right in front of his handsome school on Western. The new parishes preempting his original boundaries were St. Basil's (1920), St. Gregory and St. Kevin (1923), Christ the King (1926), and Cathedral Chapel (1927).
Father William Forde, the first pastor, was born and reared in Cork, Ireland. He grew up in the shadow of the abbey of St. Clofert, where Brendan was its abbot for as many as 1000 monks. Around the road from Cork, facing the ocean is St. Colman's, an old gothic church in which the young Forde was an altar boy. It can be clearly seen on viewing St. Colman's that it was the inspiration for the second St. Brendan Church which Father Forde built.
