When groundskeepers at Providence Sacred Heart Medical Center were demolishing a dilapidated storage shed, they didn't expect to find treasure hidden inside. But that's just what happened at the hospital in Spokane, Washington.
As the workers pulled down the back wall of the shed, Styrofoam peanuts spilled out and three faces emerged. The startled workers cleared away the packing material and uncovered a trio of statues — two of Mary and one of St. Joseph — that had been stowed in the wall space for about three decades.
Justin Hurtubise, the hospital's chief mission officer, calls it providential that the statues were mostly intact and left unscathed in the demolition. Their rediscovery this fall, which was covered in local news, sparked a wide discussion about why the figures wound up hidden in a wall and where they should go now.
"We've had community members who've reached out," he says. "There are many different theories about where the statues came from and what we should do with them."
In the weeks since the big find, the consternation over the hidden treasures has cleared as the hospital has uncovered details about the statues' past. More recently, the focus has shifted to how best to return the figures to display.
'These were clearly special'
Hurtubise got a text about the statues shortly after their discovery in mid-September from Michael Nafzgar, director of facilities for Providence Spokane Hospitals. Hurtubise called a colleague, Roxann Nammour, chief mission officer at Providence Holy Family Hospital in Spokane, to join him to inspect the figures.
Hurtubise remembers being overjoyed at what he saw. "I thought, what a discovery to be made, and it immediately brought a sense that these were clearly special," he says.
Both statues of Mary are made of marble. One is nearly life size and the Virgin Mother's arms are spread wide. The other statue of her is smaller and her hands are pressed together in prayer. The statue of St. Joseph also is close to life size, but in bronze.
With the statues' story unknown, several Sacred Heart staffers jumped into the role of detective. Archivists for the hospital, which is part of Providence St. Joseph Health, dug out historic photos that showed the statues on the grounds decades before. The maintenance crew contacted a retired long-time groundskeeper who remembered that the figures had been carefully stashed away, but not exactly why.
Stowed for safekeeping
The story that has emerged, Hurtubise and Nafzgar say, is that the statues of Mary once stood beside a swimming pool used by the Sisters of Providence who lived at a convent and students at the Sacred Heart School of Nursing, both once part of the Sacred Heart campus. The statue of Joseph was under a lighted awning at a parking lot near the convent.
The school and convent were closed by the 1990s when the pool was drained and the sites converted into a retreat space, the Providence Center for Faith and Healing. As that work was being done, the statues apparently went into the wall of the shed for safekeeping.
The research into the statues went even further back. For example, the archivists found that the larger statue of Mary had been shipped from Italy to Los Angeles in 1967 before making its way to Spokane. An inscription on its base of "W. A. Bushman" indicates the figure was a gift from Mr. and Mrs. W. A. Bushman Jr. The Bushmans were prolific donors to Catholic hospitals who gave works of art with the intention of enhancing the sacredness of the spaces, Hurtubise says. Statuary gifts from the couple grace the grounds of other Providence hospitals.
Nafzgar has enjoyed being part of the detective work around the statues. "I love history, and so just getting the opportunity to research and ask questions about where they came from, learning about the marble statue of Mary coming from Italy, I like little things like that," he says.
As to whether there are more treasures under wraps on Sacred Heart's campus, he says: "I'm positive there are. We are too big of a facility, too many remodels have happened over the years that there aren't more artifacts like this just waiting to be found."
Restoration and relocation
Over the years, the large Mary statue lost some fingers. Nafzgar's team is doing the needed restoration work. Then the statue is expected to become a fixture in the healing garden outside the Providence Center for Faith and Healing. That location keeps it close to its former home.
The Sisters of Providence founded Sacred Heart, Spokane's first hospital, in 1887. While they no longer have a residence in Spokane, the remains of 255 members of the congregation are in a local cemetery.
Hurtubise says the statue, like the cemetery, will serve as a reminder of the sisters' remarkable legacy. "That sense of nostalgia, that going back to our roots, I think that that has inspired our community in a significant way," he says.
He notes that in addition to being devoted to Mary, Emilie Tavernier Gamelin, the founder of the Sisters of Providence, had a special place in her heart for St. Joseph. The young widow from Montreal took the name of Mother Joseph and listed Joseph as president on the incorporating documents when she established Providence ministries in the Pacific Northwest.
The facilities crew plans to buff the Joseph statue and bring it to full luster before it goes back on display. Its destination is still being determined. Among the prospects is the grounds of Providence St. Joseph's Hospital in Chewelah, Washington, where the mission staff has petitioned for the statue of their hospital's namesake.
Meanwhile, the smaller statue of Mary has already found its home. Given the chance to keep one of the figures they discovered, the groundskeepers opted for Mary in prayer. The carpentry crew built a stand for the small figure inside a maintenance warehouse, close to where it was found.
"We felt like those statues had been watching over the grounds crew for decades," Hurtubise says, "and we thought it only right that they continue to have that sense of spiritual protection."