Show THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE SUNDAY MORNING MARCH 22 1938 at the Sli tine Bui It by Humble Barber's Dream Mow Canada Worships A T W f ' : -- a ‘ r 7 "'v- - Vtf fe I i 11 i - - : "? fc' j i? ”H P ' At 90 W Brother Andre Sees the &SU ' ’sZXZtt mrwr9Xf: Single-Hearte- d Amazing Results of His jw Life-Lon- m"' Devotion to the g i H ' Dondnion's Patron Saint ivb M '' rM ct I x I'-- ' ') ( J '& i'i VJ'- (?' - j(K v v liiiii ¥ "X A v I? Iir PNiSpiii i' ’ v ? "j ' y ' 'pis ' 'V oX j xn ii A IfX iu j ' FROM HEROD’S WRATH Flight of Joseph Mary and tha Christ-Chil- d Escaping from Herod into Egypt v Depicted by tha Famoue Artiet Dora - u Gu-ta- lN the eteep rocky flanks of Mount Royal in MontreaLstands an exstructure quisite Romanesque the oratory of St Joseph conaecrated to the patron stint of all Canada It is a cream white structure low and rambling but graceful simple and dignified yet costing many hundreds of thousands of dollars Ringed by towering trees it surveys the city of Montreal It is approached by broad sweeping avenues which wind around the pedestal of St Joseph’s statue A long memory is not required to remember the crown of Mount Royal as a forested wilderness As recently as 1904 thers was nothipfe but a tiny wooden shrint and a crude cairn to mark the site of the consecrated spot The iridescent magnificence of the present oratory has mushroomed up in a single brief generation And it is not finished Soon a gigantic basilica will rear its gleaming dome atop Mount Royal It will have cost $3000000 To this peaceful place millions of too much for him lie suffered a serious people journey from all parts of the breakdown Back on his feet undaunted he sought work as a farmhand and in world From the first moments of dawn vehicles creep this capacity managed to keep himself until sunset horse-draw- n up the precipitous flanks those who clothed and fed for several years He was 23 when he realized that cannot afford carriages walk The very he was getting nowhere in America and or old and diseased the crippled drag & he returned to live with relatives at themselves up The procession is endless While there he had Their objective is the small crypt hung Sutton Quebec to renew his friendship with crutches braces with oppprtunity offerings his old pastor the Reverend Father M testimonials of remarkable cures And to this priest young Among tha priests and brothers of Springer confessed the dream the Congregation of tha Holy Cross who Alfred at length had long been stirring in bis mind that attend the oratory there is one whom He wanted to enter the church He the uninltiate might scarcely notice At wanted to do more than that he was almost any hour ha will be kneeling on aflame with the determination to bring the hard bare floor of the crypt his to a greater devotion of the humanity head inclined in prayer He is patron saint of Canada St Joseph In very old very frail He is 90 Those his youth the figure of St Joseph had alwho know the amazing story behind the ways moved him It had been a guiding Oratory of St Joseph will tell you that spiritual ideal Now he wanted to dedithis is Brother Andre and that because cate his life to this service He had hd once had a dream his name is honored dreamed of building a beautiful shrine by millions of men and women of all to which the world would come creeds of all races The strange story smiled sadly He Father of the $3000000 basilica which grew looked at theSpringer lad sickly uneducated and d from this dream of a simple realized how unfit he was for the hard barber-portwith no recareer he proposed to undertake But d and un- Alfred was not to be sources beyond a After discouraged shakable purpose is Brother Andre’s a hard apprenticeship he was admitted to the Novitiate of the Congregation of story It begins on August 9 1845 in the the Holy Cross at St Laurent as a lay the name of brother He was poverty-ridde- n cottage at St Grsgoire Brother Andre Thegiven data was 1870 d’lbefville Quebec of Isaac and Clothi-dil- e Because he could not teach Brother Foisy Bessette poor deeply pious Andre was assigned to household duties s To the Bessettes was He was appointed doorkeeper at a nearborn their sixth child a sickly weak by parochial school He had to receive visitors learn their business and inform baby boy Alfred Tha father was desthe individual concerned It was not an of wheeHis precarious tradp perate important post but when not on duty Brother Andre found many other ways lwright and joiner (this too was St Joseph’s trade) yielded scarcely enough to make himself useful in all sorts of jobs He became official to feed them all In the terrible years humble tosimple the schoolboys charging five barber to come five more of want that were cents for a haircut And while in this children were born lowly capacity Brother Andre’s vision Slowly the bitter struggle wore down began to come true His devotion to St Joseph was already He died leaving his Isaac Bessette wife ahd her hungry brood without a a matterof ofthegeneral knowledgeto The hear students began parents little moving tales of Brother Am) re’s penny But somehow tfiis Spartan widow with the help of kindly relatives many acts of charity and kindness The and charitable neighbors managed to students began coming to him with their troubles and problems and keep her children alive Alfred who Brother Andre personal would to interwas the frailest of the lot was sent to cede with St Joseph promise on their behalf live with an uncle who agreed to see Soon the dusty roads leading to Cotes de to his education But the lad was so Neiges where the school was situated often ill that he was forced to remain were dotted with pilgrims seeking ther advice of thehumble gentle old porter-barbeaway from school for long periods Thus whose words were as simple as his life his education was rudimentary Some of these visitors were cripples When he waa 12 his mother died a crushing blow Little Alfred adored his and it began to be reported that many of were cured Brother Andre became mother Now he must find a new home them known throughout Canada as an inFor years he had heard much about the spired personage great opportunities offered to an ambiBut the great ideal of his life was not tious young lad in the United States yet realized There was still no splendid Somewhat improved in health he went shrine no beautiful structure specially to the saint ’he loved so to New England and got a job in a cotton consecrated much Rrother Andre proceeded to build mill at Plainfield Conn It was of course one himself world-famo- ip s v 1 1 I? "vXf IjWvm few - Mifagisi-Hfe- l2?rz' rV- fc V J w ’Ax!' I r : J fC2 :?y Xlil imm? 'Mkttti 1 The First Shrine of St Joteph in Montreal as It Appeared in 1904 — a Prelude to Brother Andre's Dream of the Great Basilica A HUMBLE MAN’S DREAM OF DEVOTION The $3000000 Basilica of St Joseph on Mount Royal Above Montreal as It Will Appear Whan Completed It Wes Conceived by Brother Andre Who at 90 Sees th Lower Portions of the Mighty Structure a Reality Halfway up the rugged hillside stretching from Cote des Neiges to the top of Mount Royal he fashioned a crude shrine of jagged stones piling them with his weak arms to a height of five feet In the center he placed a statue of St Joseph bought with the few pennies he had managed to scrape tog fees gether with his through the long hard years That stone shrine was the first visible result of the dream which was to culminate in the huge oratory now hair-cuttin- J Xr'v'i:'! j iettiW( r V I ' jXjLcX- If - 4- -5 ‘ poorly-educate- mwI st VU$ 7fg§ilX ' ‘ih' A Vr?l i IB - 1 ' t 7X ?A -- cumulative process upon the life and thought of the surrounding region has been altogether profound For the shrine of St Joseph as it stands today rivals in fame the Sacred Grotto of Lourdes in France The spectacle offered by the constant gathering of cripples and other sufferers hoping to be cured by divine intervention and pilgrims of every faith and creed is one that has had few parallels at any time or place The blind the paralytic the diseased the sorrowing mingling among the daily visitors attracted by tbs fame of the place wind in a long parade up the hillside passing Brother Andre on their way to the crypt And to each th venerable Brother Andre speaks hia simple formula in honor of Canada’s patron saint The procession- moves on haltingly Suddenly it stops altogether and a stillness falls as though a vast cathedral bad suddenly and mysteriously been emptied Someone has- thrown aside his crutches and taken a few steps unaided Then the crowds grow ecstatic and many fall upon their knees Brother Andre has not changed in the 60 years of his devotional task He is humble man full still a simple-hearte- d of humility and awe perhaps a trifle surprised atthe vast success of his efforts Today he cherishes but one final dream —that he may live to see the great basilica completed - V Th Crypt of th Basilica of St Joseph as It Is Today It Is Approached by a Stairway of One Hundred Steps Which Many Pilgrims Ascend on Their Knees $ er single-minde- butions however small Without anything in the way of formal announcements but simply by the Mf word-of-mout- h process and largely among the poor and needy the message spread — and gradually the flood of pilgrims grew French-Canadian- XT XX1' - v ' - r work day-by-da- y years Brother ndre had saved the meager sum of $300 the entire income from his bartering at the boys’ boarding school In 1890 he had undertaken to purchase the site But it took of the present basilica another- eight years before the first chapel a simple wooden building could be erected Personal contributions now showed s marked increase d and Brother Andre virtually now boldly hired architects workers contractors They went to work on the final structure the great basilica of Brother Andre’s lifbleng In 25 The total effect of this X- - V v t 't Wv o’ u :if f ' x ' V r' i - f s r ' § t 1-- ’ ' f 1 Life-Lon- Basilica in g Montreal standing near the original site The pilgrimages increased ft was now that Brother Andre’s vision began to show tangible signs of expanding into its final form The humble little stone shrine seemed to carry its own message to those who visited it Perhaps the beauty of the site on a high elevation above the city commanding a matchless view further contributed to the suggestion At all events in a way that it would be difficult if not impossible to trace the word got around through Montreal and soon through all Canada that an obscure lay hither had plans for a mighty shrinewnd that the fruition of those plans was possible by individual contri Cserrlsiit ISIS Kins dream The story of this achievement is now among the classic traditions of Canada the workmen would Every week-en- d ask ‘‘Shall we come back Monday?” “I don’t know” Brother Andre would answer “there is no more money now” But the workmen would always tome baik mb the same Time after time enough contributions would pour in to pay for another week's work At last the central shrine was opened And since that date voluntary contributions have deluged Brother Andre in an endless golden stream The first $700000 was used to clear the site of the future basilica and to erect the present crypt With no guarantee of further financial aid other than the public subscription authorized by the Archbishop of Montreal Brother Andre’s men piled tier tier built stone by stone a structure that was beautiful from the start but further was designed as the lower on htlae trsAsst 1 o lf °41if i n J hi - ft ix HV single-hande- A DEDICATED LIFE Brother Andre the Simple Barber-Porte- r of Montreal Whose Devotion Is Culminating in the Great $3000000 Mu "7- j it i - rtf i A MmiKiMf LEFT BY PILGRIMS Thesa Crutches at the Shrine of SL Joteph Bear Muta Testimony to th Remark abla Caret Which Have Been Effected |