The Daddy Warbucks and Fullerites Love His Napoleon Hill Patter.
Bruce Church has left a new comment on your post "Visit Historic St. John's Lutheran Church in Milwa...":
The Synodical Conference was basically the Prussian Union with Lutherans and Reformed merged together, with Walther supplying the necessary compromised Lutheran theology. St. Marcus has always been more Reformed than most Synodical Conference churches, just as it is today, diving into CG, TV, and state educational vouchers for religion-lite parochial schools.
The Reformed are noted for their unadorned churches which are four white walls surrounding a pulpit. The walls of older WELS churches used to be white plaster (no stucco please), but now many WELS pastors are in love with white drywall.
The Reformed side of St. Marcus expressed itself in the 1950s by their tearing out the ornate darkly stained gothic altar and other furnishings, and replacing them with modern blond-stained wood paneling and blond fixtures even though this didn't exactly match the rest of the church decor. The blond color went out of style and dates churches that still use it. The Reformed element in St. Marcus cared so little for the ornate woodwork that they don't even know where it ended up--maybe the landfill. By contrast, St. John's on 8th & Vliet Streets kept their ornate altar and fixtures, but painted over the dark stain with white paint:
http://www.stmarcus.org/history/
The congregation grew very rapidly in the next three decades and they soon resolved to build a larger worship space. The present red brick church was built in 1913. Its exterior was designed in the English Gothic style, with large square towers, limestone trim, wide windows with a flatter arch and castle-like crenelations at the tops of the two towers. The interior still utilized the German Gothic style with its dark, richly carved oak woodwork, curving balcony railing and elaborate hymn-board surrounds.
As the 75th anniversary in 1950 approached, the congregation chose to renovate and change the interior of the church. New carpeting and chandeliers were added, and the decision was made to remove the altar, pulpit, canopy, modest communion rail, baptismal font and lectern. No one knows what happened to any of those items. All that survived is the Gethsemane oil painting, which currently hangs in the second floor school hallway and the gilded dove from the canopy (symbolizing the Holy Spirit), which for 47 years was mounted in a frame and hung above the main doors to the nave.
In its place, the committee chose to install blond oak chancel furniture in the Modern Gothic style, very fashionable in the 1950's. The elaborate stenciling on the walls was painted over a tall wainscot paneling was installed on either side of the altar. During the centennial year of 1975 artist Jerome Harders, a son of the congregation, was commissioned to carve a large blond oak cross, which was then mounted in the center of the altar in front of the red velvet dossal curtains. In 1983, St. Marcus was given the historic chancel furniture from the demolished St. Jacobi Lutheran Church on 13th & Mitchell on the south side.
In 1996, the church was ready for another renovation. After the Council and Altar Guild pondered the changes needed and desired, they finally started the remodeling. The carpet was replaced and the wood floors were sanded and given four coats of water-based varnish. The pews were moved to give an additional two inches of leg-room.
