Years of Work, Dreams Shape New Cathedral

When George Washington and architect Pierre L’Enfant were planning the capital city in the late 1700s, they happened to visit Treasury Secretary Joseph Nourse, whose home was on the highest point of land in the area.

Nourse told his visitors about his dream of seeing a church there one day. And, to that end, a small box containing 50 gold dollars and a note designating the money “for a free church on Alban’s Hill” was found after the death of Nourse’s granddaughter, who shared his goal.

Today, more than two centuries after Nourse told Washington of his dream--and 79 years after President Theodore Roosevelt laid the Washington Cathedral’s foundation stone with the same silver trowel that Washington used to set the cornerstone of the U.S. Capitol--what could be the world’s last great piece of Gothic architecture is nearing completion.

Great Monument

“We’re just beginning to think about it,” Provost Charles A. Perry says of that day in 1989 or 1990 when the cathedral, one of the Western world’s great monuments to Christianity, is expected to be completed and consecrated.

Even with the benefits of today’s sophisticated technology, building a genuine Gothic cathedral is a slow, laborious task. In these fast-paced times--when new skyscrapers seem to take form overnight from heaps of glass and steel--the Washington Cathedral rises slowly on this city’s horizon, like an old, gray lady from her rocker.

“We just keep setting one stone on top of the other and keep going up,” says Richard T. Feller, clerk of the works, who oversees the massive project. With its ribbed vaults, pointed arches, flying buttresses and large windows, the cathedral has been “a very, very complex problem” to build, says Feller, a civil engineer who has spent more than 30 years at work here.

The Episcopal cathedral is also known as the National Cathedral and the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and Paul. Modeled in the English Gothic style of the 14th Century, it dominates the skyline atop Mt. St. Alban. Each year, 300,000 visitors, in addition to 250,000 worshipers, pass through the cathedral’s doors. Work on the interior is completed except for some finishing touches.

“It’s our national cathedral,” says Annie Lou White of Pasadena, Calif., a member of the 14,000-member National Cathedral Assn.’s board of trustees, “and it’s a symbol to all of us--not just in the Episcopal church, but to the whole country.”

Massive Structure

This symbolism is matched by the cathedral’s sheer physical mass. At an estimated weight of 150,000 tons and 518 feet in length, the cathedral ranks behind only five others in the world for overall size: St. Peter’s in Rome, the Seville cathedral, St. John’s in New York and the edifices of Liverpool and Milan.

Over the years, a main ingredient in the progress of this elaborately carved limestone cathedral has been the efforts of a corps of artists, sculptors and skilled craftsmen who spent years at work here. It is a group that is steadily vanishing. All of the original stone carvers and masons have retired or died.

In addition to the myriad physical obstacles presented by such a project--which Feller says is based on precision and perfection--there has been a periodic problem of money.

Work on the cathedral was interrupted during both world wars and was halted again for several years in the late 1970s, after a construction debt of millions of dollars had accumulated. Today, Feller says, “We pay as we go.”

Perry estimates that $50 million has been spent on the cathedral, a figure that represents between $150 million and $200 million in current dollars. Although that expense would make a comparable undertaking virtually impossible today, financing the project over the years has been no small task for an organization that depends on public donations and contributions to continue the construction.

Fund-Raising Campaign

Perry estimates remaining construction costs at $9 million, and is launching a campaign to raise the last $4.5 million needed to complete the task.

Most of the money is needed for the twin west towers of St. Peter and St. Paul over the main entrance. About a third of the work on both towers, which are being built in tandem to cut costs, has been completed.

The building blocks of buff limestone still are set by masons, but there are some modern aids that ancient engineers would have envied. In fact, the tall Linden crane--now a fixture in the building of skyscrapers in this country--was first brought to America for work on the cathedral.

All of the stone comes from Indiana quarries that have supplied the cathedral since construction began. The cathedral’s planners wanted to be sure that there would be ample supplies of the buff limestone for the duration of the building--to prevent eyesores such as the mismatched stones visible on the Washington Monument.

Among the array of flowers, seashells, angels and animals that adorn this majestic edifice--all examples of the elaborate Gothic artistry that has withstood centuries of architectural alteration--are a number of surprises. One is a small limestone likeness of Darth Vader, villain of the movie “Star Wars,” waiting to be set in place by the masons.

‘Draw a Grotesque’

Darth Vader was carved after 13-year-old Chris Rader of Kearney, Neb., won third place in a “draw a grotesque” contest, in which 1,400 children from 16 countries participated. Also, in recognition of “The Stone Carvers,” the documentary film about the cathedral’s artisans that won a 1985 Academy Award, one of the stone figures will hold an Oscar.

The ancient cathedral builders undoubtedly would be surprised also to find in such a structure a guard command post equipped with extensive electronic climate, fire and burglar alarm controls. Laser beams monitor the cathedral’s foundation for settling and other sophisticated systems analyze the impact of air pollution on the exterior.

Much of the building’s design is the work of architect Philip Hubert Frohman, who studied at Caltech and worked on the cathedral for half a century--from 1921 until he retired in 1971.

Frohman, who is said to have climbed the scaffolding daily, once wrote that he hoped the “Washington Cathedral might become the Westminster Abbey of America.” He died in 1972, after being struck by a car in the shadow of the cathedral, where he is interred.

Strict Building Standards

Feller, who came out of retirement to oversee the project’s completion, is a self-described perfectionist. He insists that his building standards are far stricter than those of most other construction projects.

“It’s such a pleasure to work here because they demand the best,” says Peter (Billy) Cleland, the master mason. “I tell my men: ‘Take your time--you’re building something to last 2,000 years.’ ”

Such longevity has been made painfully clear to the builders and craftsmen who have spent decades working on the cathedral. Feller recalls a day in the late 1970s as they were working on the nave, when he suddenly realized that everyone involved soon would be retired. “We took all kinds of pictures so other people would know how to do the work, and do it economically,” he said.

Along with the mortar and muscle that goes into building a cathedral, those who work on the awesome stone structure say, goes an unspoken faith and devotion.

“This building is part of me,” says Vincent Palumbo, 50, the master stone carver, who followed in his father Paul’s footsteps to work here.

Recruited Students

Today, after 25 years here, he is the only remaining stone carver with long experience. To finish the carving, he has recruited a number of young students and is teaching them his craft, in hopes that they, too, will carry on a skill of which he is so proud.

“No book in the world can tell you how to give life to a flower or make a face full of life,” he says. “Only experience can do that.”

The masons will cease setting stone in 1988, so that the carvers can finish all their work. Then the masons will return to set the last pinnacles--the turrets that taper to the rooftop.

Feller plans to be there when the final stone is lifted into place.

“I hope to set that stone,” he says.