Old rectory comes down, improvements on the way

St. Jude Thaddeus Church took its first major step Monday in improving parking and playgrounds at the school with the destruction of the old rectory.

The rectory, built somewhere between 1915 and 1920, will be replaced with off-street parking, opening up space between St. Jude Thaddeus School's elementary building and its middle school, Havre Central, for improvements to the school playgrounds.

The Rev. Dan Wathen, pastor at St. Jude's and superintendent of the school, said in a recent interview that the playground improvements still are in the planning stages. He said he leans toward laying a lawn in the playground area, although that still is to be determined.

The new playgrounds also are expected to include a quality outdoor basketball court, possibly full-sized depending on the design needs including removing overhead power lines.

St. Jude's intends to begin fundraising for the project, and already had $32,000 banked for the construction. The original cost estimate was $150,000 to $175,000, including the cost of removing the rectory, although the end cost could go higher.

The rectory originally was used to house the Jesuits priests in the St. Jude Thaddeus Parish, with six bedrooms in the building. The building had not been used as a residence since 1995, and the parish stopped using it for offices in 2002.

It still was used for some storage until just a few years ago, although the building was damaged when the boiler's pilot light went out early last decade and the water in the system froze, bursting the pipes and registers in the building.

Havre Daily News/Zach White

Patrick Construction equipment and workers tear down the old St. Jude's rectory building Monday morning to be replaced by a parking lot.