Remembering San Rafael churches

By Genie Watson Grady

[From the Independent Journal, Friday, March 25, 1983]

([I-J's] Editor's note: The writer is a 75-year-old San Rafael native who wrote this reminiscence of early-day local churches in a senior citizen writing project.)

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In 1868, members of St. Paul's Episcopal Church met in the old courthouse on the northwest corner of 4th and C streets until their new building was finished in October 1869 at the southwest corner of 4th and E Streets at a cost of $4,500.

When my father was a child, he lived a block away from the church on Fourth Street near Shaver. He had several boys in the neighborhood to play with, and on one Halloween he and a friend dared another friend, Jim Buckley, to climb up on the roof of the church and ring the bell in the belfry. Clang, clang went the bell and the whole town turned out! Needless to say, my grandfather, Jim Watson, caught them and my father never pulled a prank like that again.

At an annual parish meeting in January 1923, discussion was held regarding the moving of the church because the San Rafael Board of Education wanted the land for new grammar school. St. Paul's finally offered to sell the land to the Board for $15,000 and James Wilkins, a member of the congregation, offered to sell his land at Mission an De Hiery (now called Court Street) for $10,000 so the church could be moved. It took four days and four nights to move the old church to the new location. It was moved in two sections down Fourth Street and smaller sections moved down Fifth Street.

On Palm Sunday, 1924, services were held in the old church at the new location. Looking at St. Paul's now, you would never believe is still the same church. Stucco and paint can do miracles.