DIOCESAN DESIGNER
The remarkable unsung legacy of church architect Patrick Keely
by Bill Miller, Senior Reporter
Patrick Keely’s mark of mastery has been left on many of New York City’s crown jewels. With estimates ranging from 600 to 700 churches, cathedrals, and associated buildings, Keely’s architecture spans across the country and even into Canada. Although many of the buildings the “Prince of Church Architec- ture” designed in the Diocese of Brooklyn no longer exist, Keely’s impact lives on nearly 200 years later.
WILLIAMSBURG — Among the hundreds of thousands of graves at Holy Cross Cemetery in East Flatbush, there is a simple slab stone bearing a single name — Keely. Here lies the prolific — yet humble — church architect Patrick Charles Keely, who was 26 when he came to Brooklyn from Thurles, County Tipperary, Ireland in 1842. Keely had no formal education in architectural design, but he had ironclad skills in construction, carpentry, and wood carving.
Along the way, he developed the ability to design and build more than 600 churches and religious buildings in Canada and the U.S., including, up until the time of his death in 1896, all of the 19th-century cathedrals in New England and 14 Catholic churches in Brooklyn.
“He was an architectural dynamo,” said Joseph Coen, archivist for the Diocese of Brooklyn, who keeps close tabs on parish histories. “He goes from being this young, unknown young man who builds not just ordinary churches but cathedrals. … That’s a productivity that I don’t think anyone has ever matched here in the United States.”
Keely’s grave at Holy Cross Cemetery is among those of some of the most famous — and infamous — New Yorkers, including financier “Diamond” Jim Brady, Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Gil Hodges, Medal of Honor recipients, and a few mobsters.
Yet, the simple inscription of his last name is a testament to Keely’s humility and fidelity.
In the early 1950s, Francis Kervick, a professor of architecture at the University of Notre Dame, lamented that nearly 60 years after his death, the general public was unaware of Keely’s legacy.
“He was a man who was self-effacing and humble,” Kervick wrote, “and this may have been the reason that he is now so thoroughly neglected.”
Keely listed “carpenter” as his occupation upon landing in 1842 at present-day Battery Park in Lower Manhattan before moving to Brooklyn.
Growing up in a family of well-to-do builders helped the young craftsman develop his construction skills, according to Kervick.
Keely arrived in America three years before the catastrophic Irish Potato Famine, which continued through 1852. It’s unclear if Keely’s family suffered back home, but historical accounts confirm that County Tipperary endured mass starvation and subsequent food riots.
The famine killed an estimated 1 million people in Ireland and forced another million to flee the country.
Irish populations ballooned in Manhattan and Brooklyn, which drew the ire of the political party called the “Know Nothing,” who were nativists that responded with rioting and arson, as depicted in the book and film, “Gangs of New York.”
Still, most of these immigrants were Catholic, which prompted the need for more churches — and priests to pastor them. Into this mix came the newly ordained Father Sylvester Malone, also from Ireland, in 1844. His only job for his entire priesthood was to pastor a Catholic congregation in Williamsburg.
The parish was called St. Mary’s Church when Father Malone arrived. He renamed it Sts. Peter and Paul Parish, and determined he needed a new building for the growing congregation. He turned to a fellow Irishman he met recently — the carpenter Patrick Keely.
“Together they worked out a plan,” Kervick wrote, “and Keeley presented what was styled a Gothic church.”
Sts. Peter and Paul Parish on 3rd Street became the first church attributed to Keely. Father Malone and the builder remained friends for the rest of their lives.
Although that church was demolished and replaced with the current building, according to Kervick, it “marked the beginning of a new epoch in Catholic architecture.”
“Keely,” he added, “was approached from all sides with requests for designs of churches and other necessary structures for an expanding religious life. On Long Island alone, there was a great wave of Catholic settlers for whom churches were urgently needed. Keely was the only one thought of to do the work.”
Many of the buildings still stand, each displaying Keely’s keen appreciation of Gothic-style churches with towering steeples, pointed arches, spires, and stained glass.
The Brooklyn portfolio includes St. Anthony of Padua in Greenpoint, Mary Star of the Sea in Carroll Gardens, and St. John the Baptist in Bedford-Stuyvesant. St. Charles Borromeo in Brooklyn Heights is known as a “milestone” for Keely, as it was his 325th completed church.
In his 1953 biography of Keely, Kervick wrote that Keely’s contemporaries had died, and although the architect and his wife, Sarah, had 17 children — some of whom also became architects — they, too, were gone. Kervick, without survivors of Keely to interview, relied on his business letters to source the architect’s integrity.
One such memo was sent in 1849 to the Brooklyn-born prelate who would become the first cardinal in the U.S. — John McCloskey. At the time, he was the bishop of Albany, but would later become the archbishop of New York.
Keely wrote to Bishop McCloskey to defend himself against complaints from trustees of a new church upstate. According to Kervick, Keely wrote: “I received your letter yesterday which makes me feel sorry that so many complaints are against me and in having you feel annoyed on account of me.” He further wrote that he aimed to defend himself, but if then-Bishop McCloskey was unmoved, he would resign and accept no pay for work already completed.
“If you give me nothing,” Keely added, “I never will ask or trouble you for it.”
Ultimately, the future Cardinal McCloskey decided in favor of Keely, who went on to complete more work in Albany, such as the Immaculate Conception Cathedral in 1852.
Keely died at his home at 257 Clermont Ave. at age 80. He is among 1,500 New Yorkers who died of complications related to a massive heat wave in 1896. Father Malone eulogized his friend of 50 years in a tribute republished in the book, “Diocese of Immigrants: The Brooklyn Catholic Experience, 1853-2003.” The priest wrote that Keely was a man who “honored and served God as fervently as a priest or bishop at the altar.”
“He had genius, inspiration, and stimulus of Catholic principles and of the Catholic Faith deep down in his soul,” Father Malone further stated. “His was a great missionary work, and we would be unworthy of the Celtic race, unworthy of benediction, were we to allow the memory of such a man to perish.”
BUILDING FAITH
ONE CHURCH AT A TIME
Patrick Keely’s mark of mastery has been left on many of New York City’s crown jewels. With estimates ranging from 600 to 700 churches, cathedrals, and associated buildings, Keely’s architecture spans across the country and even into Canada. Although many of the buildings the “Prince of Church Architecture” designed in the Diocese of Brooklyn no longer exist, Keely’s impact lives on nearly 200 years later. The following timeline includes a sampling of Keely’s Brooklyn projects that still stand — unless otherwise noted.
1816
Patrick Charles Keely is born Aug. 9 in County Tipperary, Ireland. He learns the trade from his father, a local builder. There is no record of him receiving any education in architecture.
1842
Keely, age 26, lands in Brooklyn as waves of immigrants are subjected to anti-Irish and anti-Catholic hysteria. With his limited training, he finds work in construction.
1846
Keely marries Sarah Farmer and they have 17 children. Two of his sons, John and Charles, follow his footsteps into architecture. Later, he and his brother-in-law, James Murphy, found Keely & Murphy architectural firm and take on two of Keely’s sons-in-law, Thomas Houghton and William Turner.
1848
Keely makes a lifelong friend in priest and architect, Father Sylvester Malone. He commissions Keely to build a new church in Williamsburg named Sts. Peter and Paul, Keely’s first. The mayor of Brooklyn prevents “know-nothings,” anti-Irish nativists, from burning the church. The original building was demolished and is now located in a former opera house at 288 Berry St.
1853
Construction starts on St. Mary Star of the Sea, 467 Court St., Carroll Gardens in the newly formed Diocese of Brooklyn. Keely designs the church with a clear view of New York Harbor — a feature fitting of its “Star of the Sea” name. His future son-in-law, Thomas Houghton, serves as an apprentice.
1860
Keely begins construction on St. Anne Church, 251 Front St. in Vinegar Hill, near Downtown Brooklyn. It is dedicated a year later. Today, condominiums have taken its place.
1865
Keely begins design work for a new diocesan cathedral in Fort Greene. Named the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, the church never came to be. Bishop Thomas Edmund Molloy, third prelate of the diocese, cancels the project in the 1930s to fund more Catholic high schools and the building becomes part of Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School.
1867
Keely builds the Oratory Church of St. Boniface at its new location, 190 Duffield St., in Downtown Brooklyn, to address an influx of German immigrants.
1868
Keely starts work on St. John’s College Hall on a new Vincentian-run campus at 75 Lewis Ave., Bedford-Stuyvesant. The campus moves to Queens in the 1950s and becomes St. John’s University.
1869
Keely completes a milestone structure: his 325th holy building — St. Charles Borromeo Church, 19 Sidney Place, Brooklyn Heights, where much of his original design remains.
1873
Bishop John Loughlin lays the cornerstone for Keely’s design of a new St. Stephen Parish at Summit and Hicks Streets, Carroll Gardens, to accommodate the growing immigrant population. A fire destroys most of the church in 1951, but it is rebuilt and includes Keely’s signature spire salvaged from the burnt church.
1874
Keely builds St. Anthony of Padua Church, 862 Manhattan Ave., Greenpoint. The red-brick structure with limestone trim and a 240-foot spire is recognized in 1982 by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Committee. Today it is St. Anthony-St. Alphonsus Parish.
1888
Construction starts on St. John the Baptist Church, 75 Lewis Ave., Bedford-Stuyvesant — the “crown jewel” of St. John’s College campus. Keely spends six years on the project which is the final church of his career.
1896
Keely dies on Aug. 11 at his home at 257 Clermont Ave. at age 80. He is among 1,500 New Yorkers who succumb to complications from a massive heat wave. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery with a simple granite stone marked only with the name “Keely.”
DIOCESAN DESIGNER
The remarkable unsung legacy of church architect Patrick Keely
by Bill Miller, Senior Reporter
WILLIAMSBURG — Among the hundreds of thousands of graves at Holy Cross Cemetery in East Flatbush, there is a simple slab stone bearing a single name — Keely. Here lies the prolific — yet humble — church architect Patrick Charles Keely, who was 26 when he came to Brooklyn from Thurles, County Tipperary, Ireland in 1842. Keely had no formal education in architectural design, but he had ironclad skills in construction, carpentry, and wood carving.
Along the way, he developed the ability to design and build more than 600 churches and religious buildings in Canada and the U.S., including, up until the time of his death in 1896, all of the 19th-century cathedrals in New England and 14 Catholic churches in Brooklyn.
“He was an architectural dynamo,” said Joseph Coen, archivist for the Diocese of Brooklyn, who keeps close tabs on parish histories. “He goes from being this young, unknown young man who builds not just ordinary churches but cathedrals. … That’s a productivity that I don’t think anyone has ever matched here in the United States.”
Keely’s grave at Holy Cross Cemetery is among those of some of the most famous — and infamous — New Yorkers, including financier “Diamond” Jim Brady, Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Gil Hodges, Medal of Honor recipients, and a few mobsters.
Yet, the simple inscription of his last name is a testament to Keely’s humility and fidelity.
In the early 1950s, Francis Kervick, a professor of architecture at the University of Notre Dame, lamented that nearly 60 years after his death, the general public was unaware of Keely’s legacy.
“He was a man who was self-effacing and humble,” Kervick wrote, “and this may have been the reason that he is now so thoroughly neglected.”
Keely listed “carpenter” as his occupation upon landing in 1842 at present-day Battery Park in Lower Manhattan before moving to Brooklyn.
Growing up in a family of well-to-do builders helped the young craftsman develop his construction skills, according to Kervick.
Keely arrived in America three years before the catastrophic Irish Potato Famine, which continued through 1852. It’s unclear if Keely’s family suffered back home, but historical accounts confirm that County Tipperary endured mass starvation and subsequent food riots.
The famine killed an estimated 1 million people in Ireland and forced another million to flee the country.
Irish populations ballooned in Manhattan and Brooklyn, which drew the ire of the political party called the “Know Nothing,” who were nativists that responded with rioting and arson, as depicted in the book and film, “Gangs of New York.”
Still, most of these immigrants were Catholic, which prompted the need for more churches — and priests to pastor them. Into this mix came the newly ordained Father Sylvester Malone, also from Ireland, in 1844. His only job for his entire priesthood was to pastor a Catholic congregation in Williamsburg.
The parish was called St. Mary’s Church when Father Malone arrived. He renamed it Sts. Peter and Paul Parish, and determined he needed a new building for the growing congregation. He turned to a fellow Irishman he met recently — the carpenter Patrick Keely.
“Together they worked out a plan,” Kervick wrote, “and Keeley presented what was styled a Gothic church.”
Sts. Peter and Paul Parish on 3rd Street became the first church attributed to Keely. Father Malone and the builder remained friends for the rest of their lives.
Although that church was demolished and replaced with the current building, according to Kervick, it “marked the beginning of a new epoch in Catholic architecture.”
“Keely,” he added, “was approached from all sides with requests for designs of churches and other necessary structures for an expanding religious life. On Long Island alone, there was a great wave of Catholic settlers for whom churches were urgently needed. Keely was the only one thought of to do the work.”
Many of the buildings still stand, each displaying Keely’s keen appreciation of Gothic-style churches with towering steeples, pointed arches, spires, and stained glass.
The Brooklyn portfolio includes St. Anthony of Padua in Greenpoint, Mary Star of the Sea in Carroll Gardens, and St. John the Baptist in Bedford-Stuyvesant. St. Charles Borromeo in Brooklyn Heights is known as a “milestone” for Keely, as it was his 325th completed church.
In his 1953 biography of Keely, Kervick wrote that Keely’s contemporaries had died, and although the architect and his wife, Sarah, had 17 children — some of whom also became architects — they, too, were gone. Kervick, without survivors of Keely to interview, relied on his business letters to source the architect’s integrity.
One such memo was sent in 1849 to the Brooklyn-born prelate who would become the first cardinal in the U.S. — John McCloskey. At the time, he was the bishop of Albany, but would later become the archbishop of New York.
Keely wrote to Bishop McCloskey to defend himself against complaints from trustees of a new church upstate. According to Kervick, Keely wrote: “I received your letter yesterday which makes me feel sorry that so many complaints are against me and in having you feel annoyed on account of me.” He further wrote that he aimed to defend himself, but if then-Bishop McCloskey was unmoved, he would resign and accept no pay for work already completed.
“If you give me nothing,” Keely added, “I never will ask or trouble you for it.”
Ultimately, the future Cardinal McCloskey decided in favor of Keely, who went on to complete more work in Albany, such as the Immaculate Conception Cathedral in 1852.
Keely died at his home at 257 Clermont Ave. at age 80. He is among 1,500 New Yorkers who died of complications related to a massive heat wave in 1896. Father Malone eulogized his friend of 50 years in a tribute republished in the book, “Diocese of Immigrants: The Brooklyn Catholic Experience, 1853-2003.” The priest wrote that Keely was a man who “honored and served God as fervently as a priest or bishop at the altar.”
“He had genius, inspiration, and stimulus of Catholic principles and of the Catholic Faith deep down in his soul,” Father Malone further stated. “His was a great missionary work, and we would be unworthy of the Celtic race, unworthy of benediction, were we to allow the memory of such a man to perish.”
Blueprints of Hope: The Story Behind Brooklyn’s Lost Cathedral
FORT GREENE — Famed 19th-century Irish American church architect Patrick Keely built approximately 19 major cathedrals in Canada and the U.S., including Newark; Boston; Chicago; Cleveland; Natchez, Mississippi; and Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Unfortunately, none of those elaborate Gothic-style cathedrals are in Keely’s adopted city of Brooklyn, although he died in 1896 believing one of his designs would be built there.
In 1865, Keely began designing the proposed Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception for the new Diocese of Brooklyn, which was established in 1853. Its towering twin spires would rival those of the new St. Patrick’s Cathedral in neighboring Manhattan.
The proposed cathedral, originally intended to replace the Cathedral of St. James in Downtown Brooklyn, is sometimes called the “Cathedral That Never Was.”
“That’s a bit of a misnomer,” said Joseph Coen, archivist for the diocese. “I’ve used that term myself, but technically, it was partially built.”
An estimated 25,000 people turned out on June 21, 1868, for the dedication at the proposed site on Clermont Avenue in Fort Greene. Dignitaries included Bishop John Loughlin of Brooklyn and Archbishop John McCloskey of New York.
Bishop Loughlin died in 1891, and his successor, Bishop Charles McDonnell, vowed to keep the cathedral plans moving. A venue for daily Mass, St. John’s Chapel, was completed along with the bishop’s residence as part of the cathedral project.
Meanwhile, Bishop McDonnell retained the Cathedral of St. James as the temporary “pro-cathedral” for the diocese.
Keely, who resided near the new cathedral’s site, attended Mass daily at its chapel — which was built at the start of the project — until he died in 1896.
Thus, Keely and Bishops Loughlin and McDonnell went to their graves believing the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception would be finished one day.
Coen said Keely’s magnificent cathedral design ultimately failed during the Great Depression when Bishop Thomas Edmund Molloy, the diocese’s third prelate, decided to cancel the project.
“Molloy had been an auxiliary bishop under McDonnell,” Coen said. “But by the 1930s, he was in critical need of high schools. The population had been increasing since Bishop Loughlin’s time.”
Bishop Molloy subsequently sacrificed the building of the cathedral for new schools, including two named for his predecessors — Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School on Clermont and the now-closed Bishop McDonnell Memorial High School on Eastern Parkway.
Bishop Molloy lived at the bishop’s residence on
Clermont Ave. but later turned it over to the De La Salle Christian Brothers, who taught at the school. The residence now houses students at Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School.
The Cathedral of St. James became the permanent cathedral of the diocese in 1972 and was named a basilica 10 years later. In 2013, the larger St. Joseph’s Church in Prospect Heights became the co-cathedral to handle celebrations with larger congregations.
Now, the massive blueprint for the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception remains in the archives under Coen’s protection — the only vestige that it was ever considered.
BUILDING FAITH
ONE CHURCH AT A TIME
Patrick Keely’s mark of mastery has been left on many of New York City’s crown jewels. With estimates ranging from 600 to 700 churches, cathedrals, and associated buildings, Keely’s architecture spans across the country and even into Canada. Although many of the buildings the “Prince of Church Architecture” designed in the Diocese of Brooklyn no longer exist, Keely’s impact lives on nearly 200 years later. The following timeline includes a sampling of Keely’s Brooklyn projects that still stand — unless otherwise noted.
1816
Patrick Charles Keely is born Aug. 9 in County Tipperary, Ireland. He learns the trade from his father, a local builder. There is no record of him receiving any education in architecture.
1842
Keely, age 26, lands in Brooklyn as waves of immigrants are subjected to anti-Irish and anti-Catholic hysteria. With his limited training, he finds work in construction.
1846
Keely marries Sarah Farmer and they have 17 children. Two of his sons, John and Charles, follow his footsteps into architecture. Later, he and his brother-in-law, James Murphy, found Keely & Murphy architectural firm and take on two of Keely’s sons-in-law, Thomas Houghton and William Turner.
1848
Keely makes a lifelong friend in priest and architect, Father Sylvester Malone. He commissions Keely to build a new church in Williamsburg named Sts. Peter and Paul, Keely’s first. The mayor of Brooklyn prevents “know-nothings,” anti-Irish nativists, from burning the church. The original building was demolished and is now located in a former opera house at 288 Berry St.
1853
Construction starts on St. Mary Star of the Sea, 467 Court St., Carroll Gardens in the newly formed Diocese of Brooklyn. Keely designs the church with a clear view of New York Harbor — a feature fitting of its “Star of the Sea” name. His future son-in-law, Thomas Houghton, serves as an apprentice.
1860
Keely begins construction on St. Anne Church, 251 Front St. in Vinegar Hill, near Downtown Brooklyn. It is dedicated a year later. Today, condominiums have taken its place.
1865
Keely begins design work for a new diocesan cathedral in Fort Greene. Named the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, the church never came to be. Bishop Thomas Edmund Molloy, third prelate of the diocese, cancels the project in the 1930s to fund more Catholic high schools and the building becomes part of Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School.
1867
Keely builds the Oratory Church of St. Boniface at its new location, 190 Duffield St., in Downtown Brooklyn, to address an influx of German immigrants.
1868
Keely starts work on St. John’s College Hall on a new Vincentian-run campus at 75 Lewis Ave., Bedford-Stuyvesant. The campus moves to Queens in the 1950s and becomes St. John’s University.
1869
Keely completes a milestone structure: his 325th holy building — St. Charles Borromeo Church, 19 Sidney Place, Brooklyn Heights, where much of his original design remains.
1873
Bishop John Loughlin lays the cornerstone for Keely’s design of a new St. Stephen Parish at Summit and Hicks Streets, Carroll Gardens, to accommodate the growing immigrant population. A fire destroys most of the church in 1951, but it is rebuilt and includes Keely’s signature spire salvaged from the burnt church.
1874
Keely builds St. Anthony of Padua Church, 862 Manhattan Ave., Greenpoint. The red-brick structure with limestone trim and a 240-foot spire is recognized in 1982 by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Committee. Today it is St. Anthony-St. Alphonsus Parish.
1888
Construction starts on St. John the Baptist Church, 75 Lewis Ave., Bedford-Stuyvesant — the “crown jewel” of St. John’s College campus. Keely spends six years on the project which is the final church of his career.
1896
Keely dies on Aug. 11 at his home at 257 Clermont Ave. at age 80. He is among 1,500 New Yorkers who succumb to complications from a massive heat wave. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery with a simple granite stone marked only with the name “Keely.”