Legacy: Looking for Jewels in Church's Ashes

By Michele Ingrassia | Staff Writer

When fire broke out in St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Islip on Dec. 5, 1989, it threatened not just a crisis of faith, but an artistic crisis as well: Of the 20 stained glass windows in the 150-year-old church, eight were the work of Louis Comfort Tiffany. Fortunately, the process of rescuing them began even before the arson fire was out. As the blaze soared through the roof, Rector Jerome Nedelka stood with firefighters, trying to guide their hatchets and hoses away from the precious panels. ``You try to be gentle,'' he says, ``but how gentle can you be?''

Several windows were smashed. The ``Recording Angel,'' a 5,500-piece panel, was among many encrusted with soot. Virtually untouched, however, was ``St. Mark,'' an early ecclesiastical figure window by Tiffany, who was a sometimes worshiper at St. Mark's and a friend of many parishoners, including William K. Vanderbilt, who financed the construction of the church.

Like the rescue of St. Mark's, the salvaging of the Tiffanys owed itself to the community. For three weeks, legions of volunteers sifted ashes looking for jewel-like slivers. ``There was no heat, everything was wet and temperatures were in the 30s,'' Nedelka says. ``Still, they got 97 percent of the glass.''

In the end, it fell to East Marion glass restorer Jack Cushen to bring the windows back to life in a six-month, $250,000 project. ``You should have seen those poor windows hanging there after the fire,'' Cushen says. ``It's amazing how wonderful they came out.''