City Methodist Church in Gary, Indiana, was built in 1925 by the design firm of Lowe & Bollenbacker. This Gothic Revival house of worship is built of limestone and stands nine storeys tall. It was built at a cost of more than $1 million by Rev. William G. Seaman and includes the church, commercial and office space, classrooms, meeting rooms, an auditorium, a motion picture booth, a banquet hall, fellowship garden, gymnasium, rooftop garden, and a sanctuary. It was badly damaged in the Great Gary Arson of 1997 which also damaged the Memorial Auditorium. The congregation moved in 1974 and sold the building to Indiana Univeristy but it was never used by them.
Today the property is owned by the City of Gary and it is just a shell of it’s former splendour. It reminded me of stone church ruins you see in England, with vegetation and vines growing within its broken walls. Most recently (2009), it was the location for a scene from the new Michael Bay remake of “Nightmare on Elm Street” (don’t get me started). One architect has offered to turn it into a “ruins garden” – that sounds like a great idea.
