When Dean Bradley resigned in 1930, St. Paul's and the community were facing a future of extreme change. The Roaring Twenties would become the Dismal Thirties. The full effect of the Great Depression would not be felt for another year but it had begun. Change would also come to the parish and the County through two other projects then in their infancy - the building of the Golden Gate Bridge and of Hamilton Field, later Hamilton Air Force Base.
In November 1929, the first drilling began for the bridge - a bridge that had close connections with St. Paul's Church. James H. Wilkins, a member of and a benefactor to St. Paul's, made the first suggestion to span the Golden Gate with a bridge in 1916 when he was mayor of San Rafael. Plans for Hamilton Field were confirmed in late 1929 at a barbecue on the McNear Ranch (now the grounds of the Church of the Redeemer), with local and federal officials attending and announcing the selection of the site north of town. In the next decade, both projects would cause social changes in the County, but they also provided much needed and welcome jobs in the 1930s to counter the severe unemployment.
Beyond the local parish and community, the national Episcopal Church brought forth its first major revision of the Book of Common Prayer - now known as the 1928 Prayer Book. The revision began with a memorial to the General Convention of the national church in 1913 by the Diocese of California and the Bishop of California, The Right Reverend Edward Lambe Parsons, who was one of the scholars responsible for it. The new books were in the pews by the early part of 1930, and although no violent opposition appears in the records, a quote from the Bishop in the Pacific Churchman in November 1929 reveals what may have been some discontent:
The new book is by no means perfect. There are many things that many of us wanted which could not be included. I commend it to you, dear people of the Diocese, with the earnest prayer that it may be a real help and stimulus in our private devotional life as in our public worship.
Also in the year 1930, small beginnings of war were appearing in the world that would soon involve the United States, San Rafael and St. Paul's. That year the Nazi Party gained 107 seats in the German legislature, and France began to build the Maginot Line as a first line of defense against invasion from Germany. Thus the new rector had many difficulties to face beside that of replacing a man who had been very popular in the parish over a long period of time.
The Reverend Herbert I. Oberholtzer, called to St. Paul's in 1930, was a specialist in Christian Education and immediately reformed the Sunday School and formed a junior choir with sixteen members. During this period from 1930 to 1938, the average weekly attendance at Holy Communion and Morning Prayer was about eighty and the Sunday School attendance was about fifty. Evidently, the Sunday School was popular. Parish records also show weekly services at Arequippa, at that time a sanitarium for tuberculosis patients.
The first pastoral visits to the new Hamilton Field were recorded in 1935.
As the Depression deepened, the parish went into debt.
Mr. Oberholtzer offered to lower his salary, but the vestry refused his offer. To meet the budget deficit, the vestry acquired a mortgage on the buildings to maintain the parish. The annual budget for 1934 was $4,523.
Mr. Oberholtzer encountered great personal difficulties during these years also. His wife died and he became very ill. The service book contains the signatures of many priests substituting for him over a long period of time. Eventually, in 1938, he resigned and moved to Southern California, where he lived for many years - but always in poor health.
The man who replaced him at St. Paul's on All Saints Day in 1938 was young and full of energy and ready to lead the parish through the war years and into the period of great growth after the war. The Reverend Frederick H. Avery, his wife, Dorothy, and their two small daughters were welcomed to St. Paul's with a reception at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Berrian Anderson. From then until he resigned in 1945, his energy seems to have permeated the parish and the town of San Rafael.
The first annual meeting in 1939 filled the old Guild Hall to capacity, and 108 dinners were served by the ladies of St. Paul's. By February, 1939, the Epistle was born, and nursery care for infants during the church service was established, as well as the Order of St. Vincent's for acolytes, and a young peoples' group known as Lambda Delta Kappa. The latter sent delegates for the first time to the Diocesan House of Young Churchmen that year. The increase in activity is best described a year later by a notice in the February 1940 Epistle: "Please do not let the above items disturb you -- the Rector does not plan to organize a new group each week during 1940."
He did establish more groups -- Chi Kappa for teenagers, a cherub choir for first through third graders, and what was probably the most effective group of all -- the FTNers. The First Thursday Nighters were young married couples that met on the first Thursday of the month for fellowship and just plain fun. Mrs. Avery and other members recalling these evenings forty years later said, "our children would not believe their parents could do such ridiculous things." The minutes for their meetings describe dessert refreshments served, followed by silly contests, games, dancing or sometimes movies. Often in the summer, picnic meetings were held in Gerstle Park. They sponsored fundraisers -- a dance at the Rose Bowl in Larkspur, a picnic at McNear's Beach. Reading between the lines of their "madcap antics" is a record of practical work for the church and the community. They raised money and provided labor to redecorate the parish house, supplied workers for the U.S.O. (United Service Organization), the Red Cross and the newly formed town blood bank during World War II, as well as organizers for Boy Scouts and Camp Fire Girls. For nearly twenty years, they supplied leadership and fellowship for the parish.
World War II in the Pacific brought more people to Hamilton Field, and in the spring of 1942 Marinships in Sausalito was quickly built and put into operation, bringing even more people to Marin. The parish, in order to welcome these newcomers, inaugurated a coffee hour after the eleven o'clock service. Sunday services at this time were still Holy Communion at 8 A.M. and Morning Prayer at 11 A.M., except on the first Sunday of the month when Holy Communion was celebrated at the later service also.
During this period, the parish entered more into the work in the Diocese, when the rector and people led a summer conference for the Diocese at San Rafael Military Academy (now Marin Academy). Vacation Bible School began in the Guild Hall and in the courtyard between Church, Guild Hall and Rectory where tents provided shade for the children's activities. One year the summer school produced a movie about Moses. Writing the script, researching the costumes, acting and producing became an excellent learning experience for the children. The movie remains in the parish archives.
The parish grew in these years. By January, 1943, the financial situation improved sufficiently to burn the mortgage held by a bank since the lean depression years. The number of parishioners increased to 272 and space began to become a problem.
Father Avery was active in both the Diocese and the community. At the Diocese and at the local Red Cross, he chaired the Committee for the Army and Navy. During his period with the Red Cross, a frightening fire swept Mount Tamalpais and threatened homes. He mobilized fire fighters, supplied food for the crews and kept the entire staff of volunteers busy until the fire was out.
A story in the San Francisco News in October 1941 records the first time the address of "Father" appears in the history of the parish. Prior to this, all rectors were addressed as "Mr.," "Doctor" or "Dean." In the item, "Father" Avery told a story on himself. He was walking to the church when he met two young boys. One, a boy from his parish, addressed him with the phrase, "Hello, Father." He heard the other boy say, "Aw, he ain't no father. He's married and got two kids!"
Louise Amer Boyd, a long-time member of the parish, befriended the Averys throughout their time at St. Paul's, and she hosted the farewell reception for them and their daughters, Carol and Joan, in October 1945. Father Avery accepted a call to a parish in Denver. The war ended two months before and if it, together with Hamilton Field and the Golden Gate Bridge, changed San Rafael, it was nothing to the tremendous growth about to begin.