Patterson, NY

100_8452Behind Sacred Heart Church are the gravesites of Mr. & Mrs. Spencer Hance.  The Hances were very involved in the early church there.  They donated the property that the original 1930’s chapel was built on.  When the chapel later burned in 1941, church services were held in the Hance’s residence – which was purchased from their estate after their death.

If you park in the southwest corner of the back parking lot, and walk along the property edge towards the woods, you will see a large shrine. (Forgive me, I am not Catholic so I am not familiar with these statues.)  The main statue is dedicated to Jane Izzio, but I have been unable to find out info about her. A local neighbor, who claimed to have been a caretaker of the church property for many years, said he had found in the woods one day a license plate sized plaque for the Hances, and that he relocaed it in the pachysandra bed just to the right of the large statue.  I was unable to find it.

Ther is another structure along the treeline, further away from the fence, and there is a third structure in the woods near the dead-end of Quincy Road.  Some people claim that there are more people in addition to the Hances buried in the wood, but I have been unable to find any real evidence of this.  100_8453

Sources:

www.pattersonhistoricalsociety.org.  Various dates in 2013.

www.sacredheart-patterson.org.  Various dates in 2013.

Personal interviews, staff of Sacred Heart and neighbors of the church property.  Various dates in 2013.