St. Mary's resurrection

KNOXVILLE — The majority of the interior of the historic St. Mary's Chapel remains intact even though it has been closed to the public for years.

Businessman Keith Vaughn took the Register-Mail on a tour of the building Friday, the day after he closed on a deal to buy the property from a family that had owned it for years.

"I really didn't get to talk to them. I know the three sisters when they were at a council meeting they were a little emotional afterwards, but emotional in a happy way," Vaughn said of the family that had owned it.

"Outside of the option of me, they were going to sell it to a salvage operation to ... basically architecturally salvage it and then tear the building down."

Vaughn's goal is to complete interior work and clean up the cloister, or front porch, for the public to see it during Knox County Scenic Drive in October.

"We're hoping, as long as we don't run into any hiccups," he said.

That includes taking off the red brick portion, which is what tied into the St. Mary's School for Girls that was torn down years ago, along with pouring in a new concrete base. Other priorities are the addition of handicapped-accessible bathrooms in the basement and some roof work to avoid further leaks from windows.

Knoxville City Council has previously approved Vaughn's plan to build three bridal suites on the property to turn the chapel into a wedding destination spot. Vaughn said Friday the bridal suites could be built sometime in 2018 while the primary focus is on restoring the chapel, and the cloister, first.

Vaughn initially took the proposal to the council in February and it was approved dependent on Vaughn purchasing the property at a March meeting.

Renovation work includes restoring a painting behind the altar and having a person touch-up the stained-glass windows that have survived since the chapel was erected in the 1880s.

"That's an oil painting that was painted specifically for this chapel," Vaughn said. Water damage has affected the outer edges of the piece of art, but the center of the painting remains unaffected.

Vaughn said he has received "a lot of phone calls" from random people since the February article on his project.

Those calls came from "young people wanting to have their wedding here because they're not a part of a denomination of a church, they don't belong, but they still want a church wedding. If you want to have Elvis Presley marry you, I don't care. It's not about denomination ... it's all about the history of the chapel and school. If people want to come in here and get married, I'm OK with it," Vaughn said.

When asked if weddings could occur at the chapel in summer 2017, Vaughn said he would have to evaluate that later, and cited the need to install handicapped-accessible bathrooms.

"We'll have to evaluate when Scenic Drive comes how far along we are because we could start taking reservations and hope that we would have everything in place for actual renting," he said.

Robert Connelly: (309) 343-7181, ext. 266; rconnelly@register-mail.com; @RConnelly_