Cathedral of Saint Helena

Rising above Helena's downtown on Lawrence Street are two Gothic spires that climb two hundred thirty feet, making them one of the most arresting pieces of architecture between Minneapolis and Seattle. This is the Cathedral of Saint Helena, built over sixteen years with gold rush money and the devotion of a frontier Catholic diocese that had no business constructing something this grand.

The project began in nineteen oh five when Bishop John Carroll chose the site and commissioned architect A. O. Von Herbulis, a Hungarian-born designer trained at leading European schools. Von Herbulis modeled the cathedral primarily on the Votivkirche in Vienna, a soaring neo-Gothic church built as a votive offering for the survival of Emperor Franz Joseph after an assassination attempt. Construction started with the laying of the cornerstone in October nineteen oh eight. The first Mass was celebrated inside in November nineteen fourteen while the exterior was still incomplete. The full building was not finished until nineteen twenty-four, at a total cost of roughly six hundred forty-five thousand dollars, much of it donated by the wealthy Cruse family, who had made their fortune in Helena's mines.

The interior is remarkable even by European cathedral standards. Fifty-nine stained glass windows contain eleven thousand six hundred ninety-three square feet of glass depicting scenes from the Old and New Testaments. The windows were designed and fabricated by the F. X. Zettler firm of Munich, the same atelier responsible for windows in cathedrals across Europe. The effect inside on a clear Montana afternoon, with light pouring through that much colored glass onto white marble floors, is genuinely extraordinary.

The cathedral was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in nineteen eighty. Its twin spires remain the visual signature of Helena's skyline and a reminder that this remote territorial capital once rivaled eastern cities in both wealth and ambition.