III After the Great Depression and World War II

he world was coming out of the Great Depression and about to enter World War II. While St. Francis of Assisi would see its development muted by the economic uncertainty of the 1930s, like many other institutions it rebounded in response to the baby boom and outward migration from the core of cities that followed the war. While families moving from the rowhomes of East Baltimore to what were considered wide open spaces in the Northeast spurred the start of the parish, in the late 1940s veterans came home to marry, and start families. They needed a place to worship, and then to educate their children in the Catholic tradition. Those forces would spur two crucial construction projects at St. Francis of Assisi in the early 1950s. Four decades later, an expansion to its school would serve as a statement of commitment that was uncommon in a time when others were leaving the changing city.

The participation in the life of the parish for some, like Doerfler, would come in fits and starts from the 1930s into the 21st century. For others, like Petr, their involvement remains unbroken despite moving away to another part of town. Others would leave the parish and return, or, like the Wuests, be drawn to it later in their lives. Most would marvel at the growth experienced by St. Francis of Assisi, as it developed from a hastily conceived afterthought to one that had over 900 families in the 1960s. As the city’s population decreased, the number of registered families dipped below 600, still a grand number when one considers the parish’s fitful start in 1927.