Monumental Church
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Monumental Church is an Episcopal Church built to commemorate the 72 people who died in an 1811 theater fire in Richmond, Virginia. It was designed by architect Robert Mills and constructed between 1812 and 1814. Deconsecrated in 1965, it was given by the Medical College of Virginia to the Historic Richmond Foundation, an affiliate of the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities.
It sits in the Court End neighborhood of Richmond. In 2006, regular tours began, in cooperation with the Valentine Richmond History Center's Court End Passport.
[edit] External Links
- Historic American Buildings Survey Info at Library of Congress
- Historic Richmond Foundation
- Valentine Richmond History Center
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In 2004 as Monumental Church underwent a significant renovation, a monument memorializing 72 people killed in the Richmond Theater Fire on that site on December 26, 1811, was replaced by an exact replica. The bodies of the victims are still in a brick crypt below the church.
The documentary "Saving Grace-Resurrecting American History", written and directed by Emmy Winning writer/director Eric Futterman, follows the process of using laser scanning to recreate the monument in computers, then sending the data to Ireland, where stone cutters used both high tech computer equipment and old fashioned stone-cutting to create a new 7,000 pound monument.
