Sacred Heart Church at 139 3rd St NE, New Philadelphia, OH 44663-3900 US - St. Therese at Wainwright

Bishop James Hartley, of Columbus, in April of 1921, instructed Father Wendelin Green, O.M.Cap., pastor of Sacred Heart parish, New Philadelphia, to organize and send catechists to instruct the young Catholics in the communities of Goshen, Wainwright, Midvale, Barnhill and New England. Seven years later, in 1928, the decision was made to establish a mission church in the community of Wainwright. Father Otto VonLintel, of Immaculate Conception parish in Dennison, was directed to oversee the construction of the church. In the autumn of 1928, the church under construction was officially decreed to be a mission effort of St. Francis de Sales parish in Newcomerstown. The church of St. Therese was dedicated by Bishop Hartley on May 12, 1929. The pastors of Newcomerstown cared for the congregation until 1948. Prior to the completion of the church, mass was celebrated in a remodeled dance hall on the site of the future rectory of the parish. Father Edmund McCormick, pastor 1944-1947, began the arrangement whereby the children of the parish were able to attend the elementary and high schools at Immaculate Conception in Dennison. During the pastorate of Father Michael Tabit (1947-1948), a bell tower was added to the church, chiefly through the efforts of Guy Sciarini, a very different approach to a bell with no tower from that which had been taken at St. Martin, Bolivar! The bell is inscribed with the location Sherrodsville, Ohio, and the date 1901. St. Francis of Assisi church at Sherrodsville was built in 1901, and closed in 1944. Father Joseph Buzek became the first resident priest of Wainwright in 1948, although he did not have the title of pastor. He was officially assistant priest at Immaculate Conception parish, directed by the pastor to take care of the mission churches in Wainwright and Midvale. Father Buzek arranged for the purchase of the land for the parish social hall, rebuilding the old hall as a rectory. Father Ralph Dermody, in 1950, was assigned as the first resident pastor of the parish of St. Therese, the Little Flower. The pastors of St. Therese, from 1950 until the closing of the churches in 1995, were also in charge of the church of St. Paul the Apostle, Midvale. The churches of St. Therese and St. Paul were officially closed on July 11, 1995, as part of the Diocese of Columbus’ future staffing plan. The last mass at St. Therese was celebrated on Saturday afternoon, July 8, 1995. The church and rectory were subsequently sold to private persons; the social hall was transferred to the Warwick Township trustees, for use as a township hall.

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