Celebrating 175 years
of worship

By Diane Prokop
Times Staff Writer

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church is known in Frankford and across the country for not only its magnificence as a work of art but also for changing the role of the Episcopal Church since it first took root 175 years ago.
Designed by renowned architect Frank Watson, who was a St. Mark’s parishioner, the Gothic edifice at 4442 Frankford Ave. was constructed with granite mined from the cliffs of the Susquehanna River. It also has a 129-foot tower and 69 stained-glass windows by master stained-glass artist Nicola D’Acenzo. They depict the Jesse Tree, Gospel stories and the procession of saints, all culminating in the crucifixion depicted above the main altar.
Though it never came to be, it was built to be a cathedral and the seat of the local diocese. The church is filled with elaborate limestone carvings, created by the once-acclaimed and now-defunct Whitman Studios. They include the stone-lace-like rood screen (which in medieval times would have separated the clergy from the livestock) and the reredos — the ornate screen behind the main altar, which includes carvings of saints and apostles and a choir of angels.
When St. Mark’s rector, the Rev. Jonathan Clodfelter, celebrates Sunday worship services, a statue of St. Jude holding a club looks directly at him.
“St. Jude is calling me into accountability,” Clodfelter said.
That accountability — that focusing on Christ — is what the rector credits for the growth of his congregation.
Upon his arrival in Frankford in 2002, only 17 people attended Clodfelter’s first service and only 50 attended the Easter service that year — in a church designed to hold 800. Just a few weeks ago, 150 worshipers attended Easter Sunday services at the church, which is the third to have been built during its history.
While Episcopal missions in Frankford date to 1709, St. Mark’s traces its roots in the Diocese of Pennsylvania to 1832. That’s the year when church services were first held in the Morrow Schoolhouse at Paul and Ruan streets, home to a Sunday school started in 1820 by the Rev. Sheets and Mary Glenn.
“It’s the spirit of the people that moved this church during crisis and time,” said Debbie Klak, a congregation member who noted that she’s the “fourth or fifth president” (the records aren’t precise) of the Historical Society of Frankford from St. Mark’s. Architect Frank Watson was the first.
It also was in July 1832 that cholera came to Philadelphia, and the church opened its doors as a hospital to care for those with the disease. The Rev. Dr. Spackman would even clean people’s houses to improve sanitary conditions and prevent the spread of the deadly disease.
The church grew considerably during its early years, as mills and factories and English immigrants to work in them came to Frankford. The congregation outgrew its space at the schoolhouse, renting a room at the Frankford Academy on Paul Street before moving again in 1835. They purchased a lot on Franklin (now Griscom) Street, where a building they called the Tabernacle Church was erected.
In 1837, another lot was purchased to extend the property to Main Street (Frankford Avenue), and in 1845 the cornerstone for a larger church was laid. In 1846, the name was changed from the Tabernacle to St. Mark’s Protestant Episcopal Church.
In 1844, William Welsh, a successful businessman and founder of the Philadelphia Divinity School, had become St. Mark’s Sunday school superintendent. He took a new idea from England and thought the church could literally change the world if it would address the plight of the poor people, Clodfelter said.
That was the birth of the lay cooperation in Frankford and across the country. Previously, care of the sick and oppressed fell to the ministry.
St. Mark’s rector then, the Rev. Dr. Daniel Sutter Miller, wholeheartedly supported the idea, and the church flourished under his leadership.
Parish records show there had been Bible study classes, college lectures, a parish library, a savings and loan, mothers meetings, sewing school, a burial association, a sick people’s club, diet kitchen for the sick, an almshouse mission, a temperance society and a day nursery. William Welsh’s wife Mary was instrumental in guiding many of the ministries.
“Even the poor dressed very well and had a dignity about them,” Klak said, referring to accounts in church and historical society records.
One story in a 1908 edition of the Frankford Gazette put it this way: “This work produced such astoundingly successful results that the name of Frankford became familiar throughout the Episcopal Church of the United States, most parishes of which long since adopted the methods first applied in this town.”
Welsh also wrote several pamphlets on the topic. In March 1864, it came to the attention of the country when it was discussed in the Godey’s Lady’s Book, the leading women’s publication of the day. Based in Philadelphia, it had a circulation of 150,000 before the start of the Civil War.
“What we consider to be common came right out of this church under the Welsh family,” Klak said.
Frustrated with the lack of morals and a refusal to publish the works of charitable institutions in Philadelphia daily newspapers, Welsh put out his own, The North American, for six years.
Another St. Mark’s parishioner was responsible for another movement in Frankford — a call-to-arms during the Civil War. In August 1862, Col. James Ashworth set up a recruiting station for what would become Company 1 of the 121st Volunteer Regiment. The company included 38 members of St. Mark’s who went on to fight in the battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. All told, 192 men from St. Mark’s fought the “War to Preserve the Union.”
Along McPherson’s Ridge, west of Gettysburg, Ashworth was wounded 11 times, yet survived. Others from St. Mark’s weren’t as lucky. Battlefields have claimed the lives of 39 St. Mark’s sons. Markers on the church walls commemorate them, as well as their veteran church brethren.
As part of the church’s 175th celebration, they’ll hold the Churching of the Colors on Oct. 19, when flags from U.S. allies during World War II will be brought up the aisle, and military and civic organizations will gather to pray and worship.
St. Mark’s rich history and contributions to society and the Episcopal Church continue to expand, thanks to its role in the formation of seven other churches, including St. Stephen’s in Bridesburg, St. Bartholomew’s at Comly Road and Ditman Street, the Chapel at Pin Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, and St. Mark’s in Cheyenne, Wyo. ••
For more information about St. Mark’s, its worship services and its ministries, visit www.stmarksfrankford.org
Reporter Diane Prokop can be reached at 215-354-3036 or dprokop@phillynews.com