By Shirley Shuman
Since May, workers for Rick Barker’s construction company have strived to renovate the Davis Memorial Presbyterian Church, built in 1908. According to Dr. Russell Stewart, Sessions member in charge of the church’s physical plant, “What started out as just a paint job ended in major renovation.”
Although Barker’s crew is still working in other areas of the building, they have completed renovation of the sanctuary and the outside of the building. Jay Walls who renovated the wood around the stained-glass windows, explained some details of his work. Walls noted that the work “was pretty tedious” because he also had to strip the paint down to the original wood. He commented, too, “Some of that lead paint was hard to get off.”
“From the start, my view was to take [the wood] back to its original appearance and to make it durable,” Walls said. To accomplish this, he had to remove and replace some rotten wood. To accomplish his goal of making everything look like the original, he chose soft wood and used sandpaper to finish it before he began painting. Walls did note that others worked with him on the windows, and he named Cory Barker, Shawn Talbert, and Dustin Marlatt.
Looking toward complete window renovation, Dr. Stewart asked artist Stella Gregory to try to repair the stained glass in two small windows near the top of the building. He said they had been damaged by BB shots. Gregory, who declared, “Stained glass is my passion,” explained that those two windows were beyond repair. However, she did manage to save some parts of that window. “I took all the pieces I could salvage,” she said, “and designed a new pattern. I’ve created a 2’ X 3’ panel, which we plan to frame. Workers replaced the glass in those two small windows with plexiglass.
Gregory added, “As I worked with the old glass I salvaged, I thought of the hands that fashioned it so long ago. I wondered if they cut and burned themselves as much as I had during their stained glass journey. I was honored to be able to take their work and send it on into the future.” Dr. Stewart indicated that the church plans to display that panel. Gregory said she also “made a couple of repairs to larger stained glass windows.” The construction crew put plexiglass in the two small windows.
Walls, who also did some interior work on the building, liked what he did. “I really enjoyed that work,” he said. “I’m proud of being part of that project, probably the most interesting I’ve ever been involved in because back in the day they had true craftsmen.”
This man wasn’t the only one who enjoyed the challenge that faced the workers. Randy Given, along with Nathan Tallarito, worked to restore cracked plaster before repainting the walls of the sanctuary. This, too, was tedious work. Given explained that, instead of simply trying to fill the cracks and then paint, they chose to remove the damaged plaster and rebuild it. “We tore away everything that was loose around the cracks, sometimes down to the stone wall, and started from there,” Given said.
Here Tallarito mentioned that the inside wall was made of smaller stones rather than the original huge stones of the exterior. They discovered the smaller stones while tearing out old plaster. They also discovered the reason for the cracks—water seeping through the wall from a leaky roof. Given commented that they had found evidence of earlier “repair” of the plaster in which the workers used very small staples and tiny nails and pieces of actual slate rock as the basis of new plaster. “They spaced these out and then covered them with plaster,” Given said. As other workers had commented, Given said he felt “blessed” to do this work and added, “I love restoring.”
Renovation of Davis Memorial Presbyterian Church has pleased not only the congregants of the church but also those who have done the renovation. The principal objective of the renovation, according to Dr. Stewart, was “to preserve the intact nature of the church.” All apparently agree that this has been accomplished. Funding for the renovation came from the church’s memorial fund “in respect for and remembrance of deceased members of the church,” according to Dr. Stewart.
Built in 1908, according to Braxton writer Skip Johnson, the church “was built by Italian artisans who were employed in the building of the Coal and Coke Railroad.” The outside wall of the church is made of stone from a quarry at the upper end of Highland Street in Gassaway. Henry Gassaway Davis built the church…at a cost of $20,000 and gave it to the members of the Gassaway Presbyterian Church in memory of his wife, Kate Bantz Davis. An interesting clause in the deed for the building, recorded in the Braxton County Clerk’s office, specified that half of the seats be available for members of other churches or non-members.
Currently, some members of the church are applying for Davis Memorial to be admitted to the National Registry of Historical Places. The West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture, and History reviewed the application and decided that the building is worthy of the honor.
Davis Memorial Presbyterian Church pastor, James Riggs, commented on the results of the renovation. He emphasized his impression of the workers’ attitudes toward what they did. “It was more than just a job. They took the work personally, as if they were working on their own home,” he said. “I could not be more pleased.” Pastor Riggs added, “I was not really aware of the details in the building until the renovation was being done. Furthermore, I did not realize how much was being done. “ Something which the pastor said “amazed” him was that that the contractors had found someone who could finish plaster as the workers of Rick Barker’s crew did. Just as others who have seen the completed work, Pastor Riggs appreciates the effects of the renovation.