HOLY SPIRIT CHURCH HISTORY PAGE

The picture above was lent to us by MargaretBentley who says the pic dates from about 1933. She remembers the new altar when she was 6 (which was in 1933!!)...it wasn't to celebrate a particular occasion but Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. You can see the monstrance with the host in in the middle of the altar. They did it big in those days!!

Did you know that???

Cleckheaton Advertiser Dated 12th June 1913.
Large article on the Rev Father O'Connor's generosity,
This concerned him selling valuable paintings from his collection to fund the building of the new church on Bath Road, the paintings sold included small oil paintings by Turner. The article ends when questioned about his sacrifice, he said "if I lose one thing I gain another, I shall have a church instead of pictures.

Cleckheaton Advertiser Dated 4th June 1914.
Large article on the new RC Church Bath Road.
Note I made from this, it was in 1871 that Heckmondwike became a parish when Canon Stephen Dolan the first priest built the present school and chapel in Darley Street. He had four other successors before the present one Father O'Connor. Father Russell of Keighley O'Connor's predecessor originated the idea of building a new church entirely from the school in 1904/05.
In 1871 Heckmondwike was an offshoot of Dewsbury Parish, I made this note because it was around 1866 when my great-grandparents came to Heckmondwike.

info supplied supplied by Briam Oram

...also, did you know that in the original plans the altar was going to be situated underneath the dome so everyone would be seated around it??? I don't know why these plans were changed... I have also heard many stories of the dome originally being made of copper and now covered with verdigris with age, weather,etc. My mum's brother seems to remember the dome being covered with black corrugated material during WWII so the copper would not reflect up to the German planes...

info supplied by Paula Bentley

Father Brown in GKChesterton was based on Father John O'Connor of our church

The Innocence of Father Brown
By Dale Ahlquist
While on a lecture tour of England in 1904, Chesterton met one of the most
important people in his life: Father John O'Connor, a Catholic priest who
became a lifelong friend and inspiration. It was Father O'Connor who
opened Chesterton's eyes to the Catholic Faith in a way he had never
considered and patiently accompanied on the spiritual pilgrimage that
would follow. But he also became the basis for Chesterton's greatest
fictional character, and one of the greatest characters in all of
detective fiction: Father Brown.
It all started with a friendly conversation about an article Chesterton
was proposing to write about "some rather sordid social questions of vice
and crime." Father O'Connor politely suggested that Chesterton was going
in the wrong direction with his conclusion, and to demonstrate his point,
the priest revealed "certain facts he knew about certain perverted
practices" that jolted Chesterton, who "had not imagined that the world
could hold such horrors." Later in the day Chesterton and Father O'Connor
were talking to some Cambridge undergraduates and got involved in a very
deep and lively discussion about philosophy. After the Father O'Connor
excused himself, the two college students expressed their admiration for
the priest's keen intellect but ultimately dismissed him as no doubt being
insulated and naïve about the real world. Chesterton says he almost
laughed out loud, for it was the priest who knew more about real evil and
the real world than the two Cambridge men, who in comparison knew about as
much as "two babies in the same perambulator."
The incident served as the initial inspiration for a series of mysteries
featuring a priest-sleuth whose strength was twofold. One, he could solve
crimes because he could get inside not only the criminal mind but the
criminal heart. Two, the criminals (and everybody else) would not suspect
him to suspect them because he seemed so common and naïve. His two-fold
strength, in other words, was Wisdom and Innocence.
Chesterton's first collection of Father Brown stories, The Innocence of
Father Brown, appeared in 1911 (all had previously been published in the
United States in The Saturday Evening Post). Ellery Queen called it "the
miracle book of 1911." Chesterton had done something revolutionary in
detective fiction, which at that time was dominated not only by Sherlock
Holmes, but by a myriad of poor imitations trying to outdo one another
with ever more baffling crimes and convoluted puzzles. Chesterton favored
the cozy mystery, the domestic murder, with a millionaire usually
performing the important service of being the murder victim and the scope
of the investigation narrowed to limited time, limited space, and a
limited number of suspects, with all the clues revealed to the reader as
well as to the detective. As a fan of detective fiction himself, he knew
that the reader enjoyed being fooled, but being fooled fairly. Not only
did he help establish the rules of fair play in the genre, but his
emphasis on motive and character freed detective fiction from the copycat
techniques of the rivals of Sherlock Holmes. The leading mystery writers
of his day quickly embraced this new style of murder mystery. They began
writing stories of domestic crimes with human motives, with a limited list
of suspects, with obvious (though well-disguised) clues, and with an
unlikely detective who solves his puzzles without relying on superhuman
knowledge or intelligence. Indeed, whenever you think of the great
detectives of mystery fiction's golden age-Hercule Poirot, Lord Peter
Wimsey, Miss Marple, Ellery Queen, Philo Vance, or Nero Wolfe-remember
their parentage. Remember that they had a father. His name was Father
Brown.
And there is another famous detective who was clearly inspired by Father
Brown. Like Father Brown, he was slightly comical and improbable,
unassuming, unthreatening, never taken seriously by the guilty party, but
always knowing much more than he let on. I'm speaking of course, of TV's
Columbo.
The first Father Brown story remains one of the most famous and most
reprinted: The Blue Cross. In it, a master criminal, the great Flambeau,
pretends to be a priest and tries to steal a valuable cross. Father Brown
exposes Flambeau as a fraud when the false priest attacks reason. A real
priest, says Father Brown, would defend reason because "Alone on earth,
the Church affirms that God himself is bound by reason." Apparently this
idea was too shocking for Hollywood. In the film version, starring Alec
Guinness as Father Brown and Peter Finch as Flambeau, the fake priest
gives himself away by ordering a ham sandwich on Friday.
In one of the most interesting twists in all of detective fiction,
Flambeau goes from the role of archenemy in the first few stories to
becoming a detective himself and serving as Father Brown's sidekick in the
later stories. Perhaps it was a foreshadowing of the author's relationship
with the real priest. It was long after Flambeau and Father Brown joined
forces, after almost half the Father Brown stories were written, that
Chesterton officially joined forces with the Real Father Brown. It was in
1922 that the Father John O'Connor received G.K. Chesterton into the
Catholic Church.

Fr M with First Holy communicants 1959

Photo supplied by Joan O'Connor

The following photos were very kindly supplied by Yvonne Markham

St Patricks ball

Mrs Gautry , Mrs Flynn and Yvonne Markham

The main altar before it was moved so that Mass was said with the priest facing his parishioners.

The poem below was kindly lent to us by Edgar oldroyd

To Father O'Connor

This is a book I do not like
Take it away to Heckmondwike
A lurid exile, lost and sad,
To punish it for being bad.
You need not take it from the shelf
(I tried to read it once myself:
The speeches (slur), the chapters sprawl
The story makes no sense at all)
Hide it your Yorkshire moors among
Where no man speaks the English tongue.

Hail, Heckmondwike! Successful spot!
Saved from the Latin's frothing lot
Where Horton and where Hocking see
The grace of heaven, Prosperity.
Above the chimneys hump and broad
A pillar of most solid cloud;
To starved oppressed Italian eyes,
The place would seem a paradise
And many a man from Como Lake
And many a Tyrolese would take
(If Priests allowed them what they like)
Their holidays in Heckmondwike.
The Belgian with his bankrupt woes,
Who through deserted Brussels goes
The hind that threads those ruins bare
Where Munich and where Milan were
Hears owls and wolves howl like Gehenna
In the best quarters of Vienna
Murmers, in tears "Ah how unlike
The happiness of Heckmondwike!"
In Spain the sad guitar they strike
And yearning, sing of Heckmondwike;
The Papal Guard leans on his pike
And dreams he is in Heckmondwike
Peru's proud horsemen long to bike
But for one hour in Heckmondwike;
Offered a Land Bill, Pat or Mike
Cry "Give us stones --- in Heckmondwike!"
Bavarian beer is good, belike
But try the gin of Heckmondwike.
The Flamands drown in ditch and dyke
Then itch to be in Heckmondwike,
Rise freedom, with the sword to strike!
And turn the world to Heckmondwike

Take then, this book I do not like -
It may improve in Heckmondwike.

G.K.Chesterton

Bishop Wheeler with with Mrs Gautrys grandson at his confirmation, look where the hat is

Egg and spoon race at the Whit monday party in the school playing fields around 1960. note there is no caretakers bungalow.