The beautiful building of St Thomas the Apostle, or St Thomas's Church as it's generally known, stands on Lumn Road with it's sides on Tinkers Passage and Leigh Street. It was built in 1868 at a cost of £3,000 and the church was consecrated on Wednesday, September 23rd 1868, 141 years ago. The first vicar was the Rev. A. Read who was appointed by the crown on October 9th 1846, the same year that the ecclesiastical district of St. Thomas' was founded.
(Thanks to http://www.stthomastheapostlehyde.org.uk for the info)
The Architect of the church, Medland Taylor, was a Manchester architect who produced a number of fine buildings. Locally, he designed St. Anne's, Denton, St. Mary's, Haughton Green, Holy Trinity, Hyde and the Library and the Post Office in Stalybridge.
Sadly this is what reads on their website at the moment...
"As a follow up to the article published in the Tameside Advertiser, dated 10th February 2010, regarding the future of the Parish Church of St Thomas' we feel the we need to inform you as to the real danger of the building being closed and boarded up in the non too distant future.
With an increasingly elderly congregation there is a need to find others to share the building and to find additional uses for it if it is to remain a place for Anglo Catholic worship within the Church of England. "
Sad times indeed.
(Thanks to http://www.stthomastheapostlehyde.org.uk for the info)
The Architect of the church, Medland Taylor, was a Manchester architect who produced a number of fine buildings. Locally, he designed St. Anne's, Denton, St. Mary's, Haughton Green, Holy Trinity, Hyde and the Library and the Post Office in Stalybridge.
Sadly this is what reads on their website at the moment...
"As a follow up to the article published in the Tameside Advertiser, dated 10th February 2010, regarding the future of the Parish Church of St Thomas' we feel the we need to inform you as to the real danger of the building being closed and boarded up in the non too distant future.
With an increasingly elderly congregation there is a need to find others to share the building and to find additional uses for it if it is to remain a place for Anglo Catholic worship within the Church of England. "
Sad times indeed.
UPDATED COMMENTS BELOW
8 comments:
It will be a shame if this church as to shut... St. Stephen's Flowery Field might be going the same way as well.. and I'm sure if these are struggling other will be to... I can well imagine the up roar when this building do start to shut down.. but as do not attand any church I feel I should not really comment on the closers. I can only speak as person who will be sad to see such buildings boarded up and left to thieves and vandals to destroy.
Co incidently my dad wrote a letter to the local papers a few weeks ago supporting the plight of the two local churches mentioned.
hi Ghost,
I read it in the letters page ... if it carries on like this there will only be one place of worship in Hyde... and thats next to Asda...
I was christened at St Thomas's, and I was also a choir boy here in the late 70's, when Vicar Fell was resident.
I also used to pass it every school day on my way to Leigh Street Infants/Juniors. I've always thought it was a lovely simple church, I'm really sad about the trouble it's in.
The short term future of St Thomas' church is looking more cheerful. Whilst, as is the case amongst some other church's, worshipers are still rather low in number but as people who know the church will testify to the special and spiritual place that it is. There is a renewed energy amongst the people who worship there. The electric heaters have been given an overhaul, some interior walls repainted and the outside gutters and downspouts repaired and repainted. Many other small works have also taken place adding to a new confidence. Anglo Catholic worship is the heart of St Thomas' and from December 7th a new Priest in Charge will be licensed for twelve months.
Anon..
This is very good news indeed... thank you for taking the time to update us on this...
Hello,
Good to see that the website is working and and that you are sharing the information from St Thomas' Website. I'm glad to see these discussions becoming viral and spreading through the network of blogs.
St Thomas' Website is presently being updated to allow access to users for maintenace purposes.
We get emails from as far away as Canada and Australia asking for information relating to the Church.
We have recently come across a gentleman who has film footage from 1964. This has been converted into VHS and hopefully sometime soon will be digitised for the website.
Strangley, I was born in 1964 so it would be great to see this historical artifact.
I will place links from our site to yours to continue to spread hope for the Church.
Thankyou for keeping these discussions alive.
All the best for now...
Have a Great Day
Simon
St Thomas the Apostle Hyde Website
Creator Designer and Voluntary Maintainer
I was confirmed here in 1975 by the bishop of stockport and jack oickford played the organ unforgtunately there are no records but I have a card
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