st helen

Beginnings

Following all the new housing development in the area bounded by Warwick Road, Seven Star Road, Lode Lane and Dovehouse Lane after the Second World War, there were lots of young families finding friendships, baby sitting circles and so forth. Several of them got together in each other’s houses as a prayer group, where they could nurture their faith in less formal surroundings than were available in the Parish Church. This group grew apace and soon they got too big for meeting in private houses. Meanwhile, a plot of about one acre St. Helens Road had been given to

the Parish in 1948 by Revd. R H Couchman. After much discussion and negotiation, a second hand hut was bought and erected on this plot, mostly by do-it-yourself labour ... and St. Helen’s Church proper was born.

A second hut was added later and a permanent structure built in the mid 1970s. Although there was a small chapel in this building apart from the main hall and small meeting rooms and kitchen, this soon proved too small, so a much larger chapel with vestry was built and opened in 1994. Meanwhile. the more robust of the two huts was retained for use by youth organisations, Sunday School etc., but by now it had become more of a liability than an assett, needing a great deal of repair work and its safety was very questionable.

A decision was taken therefore to scrap the hut and build a new youth hall integrated with the main building. This was completed and dedicated in November 2001. Except for the chapel, which is retained as a place of peace and tranquillity, the buildings were built for multi-purpose use and there are few times when the halls are not occupied by some group, many of them secular.