By Paula Day

Tracks of the Norfolk-Southern Railway parallel Georgia Highway 17 as it makes its way from the interstate toward the city of Toccoa. To the north and west the gray-blue Great Smoky Mountains frame the horizon.

A Jeep with two kayaks mounted on its top takes the center lane as the right-of-way widens into the three lanes typical of mountain highways. A sign invites the traveler to stop for pork barbecue stew. A yard of junked boats hints at one of the area’s recreational resources.

More than 200 years ago the Cherokee Indians named this area in the northeast corner of Georgia, “Toccoah.” The name means “beautiful” and the site was then the capital of the Cherokee nation.

Today the city of Toccoa is the Stephens County seat and home to 9,000 residents. Since the early 1800s the region has been a transportation hub. More recently it has attracted tourists and vacationers. Lakes Burton, Rabun, Yonah and larger Hartwell are within easy driving distance and the 186-foot Toccoa Falls is on the city’s outskirts.

The Tugaloo valley in which the city nestles was once a stagecoach crossroads. In the early 1800s a federal “highway” linked New England and St. Augustine, Florida, and the Unicoi Turnpike began its stretch toward Chattanooga. The Tugaloo River was dredged allowing steamboat passage to Savannah and the Atlantic. Later Southern Railway laid tracks which now slice through the center of the city. A new leg of Georgia Highway 365 has recently opened, extending access to Toccoa from Atlanta by way of I-85 and I-985. Today industry and the area’s spaces of beauty and peace draw working adults and retirees alike.

Perched midway up an incline on Rothell Road in southeast Toccoa is St. Mary’s, North Georgia’s newest Catholic church. On October 6 Archbishop James P. Lyke, PFM, dedicated the new building which replaces an all-purpose structure that had doubled as a sanctuary and parish hall for 37 years.

The church, which will seat up to 275 people, was completed in mid-July at the cost of $320,000. The parish had been hoping to replace the older structure for some time in order to have more worship space. The former sanctuary will now serve as the parish hall. The parish hall, in turn, will be renovated for much needed classroom space. David Roberts and Mike Collins of the Atlanta firm of Roberts, Collins Architecture designed the new church.

Four white columns bring a Southern flavor to the brick and wood exterior of the new church. Clear glass windows allow Georgia sunlight to stream in upon the blue-carpeted foyer. Inside and to the right is the day chapel, an intimate space with its gold tabernacle standing firmly on a stone pedestal.

In the main part of the church a crucifix, and above it, a stained glass depiction of the Madonna and Child are the only pieces of art behind the altar, making it the undeniable focus of attention.

St. Mary’s pastor, Father William Calhoun, Father John Kelly, pastor of nearby Sacred Heart Church in Hartwell, and Father Edward Branch, chaplain of Atlanta University’s Catholic Center concelebrated the 11 a.m. dedication liturgy with Archbishop Lyke. The ceremony included rituals setting aside the space for sacred purposes: a blessing and sprinkling with holy water, anointing of the altar and the church walls, and the incensing and lighting of the altar and church.

“In the ancient rites we perform today,” Archbishop Lyke said in his homily, “we look into our past in order to bring alive our ties to all ages of the Church. We hear the word of God in Sacred Scripture, and discover in the timeless actions of our spiritual ancestors, the continuity of God’s family on earth.”

After the dedication, the family of St. Mary’s gathered in the parish hall for a “spread” of Southern hospitality.

St. Mary’s now boasts a faith community of 130-households. But its beginnings were not unlike the proverbial mustard seed. In the early 1940’s a few devout Catholic families met at the home of Joe Malik to celebrate Mass. Father Michael Manning came from St. Michael’s parish in Gainesville, bringing vestments, linens, alter breads and wine in two suitcases. His congregation may have been five people. It was rarely more than 12. The priest would have already celebrated Mass in Gainesville, and he would travel from Toccoa to Clayton to offer Mass there.

It was not particularly easy for the early Catholics who came from out-of-state and were a minority in a bastion of Southern Baptists and Methodists. To be a Catholic was to be “different.” It was bad enough being a “Yankee.”

One longtime parishioner who moved to Toccoa from the West remembers insisting she was not a Yankee. “They were still fighting the ‘big old (Civil) war,’” she recalls, “and the West was still a territory.” Those attitudes have gradually changed with the passage of time and the influx of people from other parts of the country, the woman added.

It would be 1954 before those early Catholics had their own building for worship. In the meantime, they gathered for Mass in the American Legion hall and the old Albemarle Hotel which has since been torn down. With the construction of a church in 1954 the parish found a home, not only for worship but for a developing social life which included covered-dish dinners and regular meetings of the Altar Society. The mission was staffed by the Sons of the Sacred Heart, a congregation of priests familiarly known as the Verona Fathers whose headquarters were in Cincinnati.

The new church was named Mary, Mother of Our Divine Savior Catholic Church in recognition of a special diocesan-wide Mother’s Day collection to fund its construction. Parishioners shortened the name to St. Mary’s in the 1970s.

By the late 1950s the parish had grown to between 25 and 30 families, Dorothy Kelly recalls. She and her husband, Ed, came to Toccoa in 1955.

As in any mission area, the ministry of the Verona priests extended beyond the town’s boundaries. Ed Kelly remembers getting a call from Father Geno Doniney after 9 p.m. one evening asking him to go with him to Lake Rabun, some 60 miles away, to anoint a man who had just died. The couple had a cabin on the lake, a popular summer home area for Atlantans before the construction of Lakes Lanier and Alatoons. Kelly says the two men got back to Toccoa between 2 and 3 a.m.

Mary, Mother of Our Divine Savior came under diocesan jurisdiction in 1964 with the appointment of Father Joseph Drohan, the first diocesan priest to be its pastor. Father Drohan says his was a “hyphenated parish,” the Toccoa-Hartwell parish.

In a 1966 letter to Chris Eckl, then managing editor of The Georgia Bulletin, Father Drohan wrote, “The two parishes are at the north and south ends of Lake Hartwell, boarder, Toccoa at the north, Hartwell at the south. The new interstate highway, I-85, splits the parish (territory) in the very center. In the parishes are the counties of Stephens, Franklin and Hart.”

Eventually Sacred Heart in Hartwell became a separate parish. In 1987 St. Mary’s in Commerce with its congregation of approximately 20 families was made a mission of the larger St. Mary’s in Toccoa.

In the same letter Father Drohan described the outdoor shrine to the Blessed Mother just completed in the Toccoa parish.

“It is called Our Lady of the Pines,” he wrote, “and I’ll test your intelligence as to the reason for the name. The statue was carved in Italy at the request of the previous pastor, Rev. Gino Doniney of the Sacred Heart fathers. It is of Carrara marble, resting on a granite block…The concrete-block grillwork was done by parishioners. Various religious groups in the archdiocese have visited the shrine, which is the largest in Georgia dedicated to Our Lady…We have six acres of pines surrounding (the shrine). The pines were planted by Monsignor Michael Manning.”

According to Ed Kelly, the shrine has been the site for many parish celebrations, ranging from May devotions honoring the Blessed Mother to the Easter Vigil lighting of the new fire and outdoor Masses.

Father Raymond Horan followed Father Drohan as pastor in 1971. Other pastors have included Father Patrick McCormick and Father John Druding.

Father Druding says St. Mary’s parishioners are a “people who seem to value their faith deeply. Their faith is a lifestyle. “The priest, who was pastor just before Father Calhoun came to the parish in 1987, estimated that 75 percent take part in parish programs and activities. Calling Toccoa a “typical small Southern town,” Father Druding said there is “a lot of work to do” to break down common stereotypes of the Catholic Church and Catholics, but “Catholics in the community are aware of this need and work at it in their relationships.”

Parish growth has been slow but steady, Father Calhoun says. The Gerding family, Randy and Jean, and their daughters, Christina, Kimberly and Stephanie, moved to Toccoa from Michigan four years ago. On the other hand, 84-year-old Mary Hornick has lived in the area 30 years. Her two sons, Howard and Johnny, and a daughter, Marie McConnell, are parishioners, as are 12 grandchildren and a dozen great-grandchildren.

Over the years Toccoa’s location and labor pool have drawn a variety of industries to the area including furniture, textile, plastic, casket and garment manufacturing. Ed Kelly characterizes the present situation as being one of expansion of existing industries rather than the introduction of new ones.

For some time the beauty of the region has drawn people to the area. The Georgia Baptist Assembly has a conference center and resort retreat facility north of the city. The state’s Episcopal diocese operates Camp Mikell conference center, used for retreats and a summer youth program. The Georgia Camp Fire council conducts a summer camp in the mountain setting.

In 1966 a 185-year old inn, Travelers Rest, was recognized as a National Historical Landmark. Once it was the manor house for a 14,000-acre plantation as well as an overnight accommodation for stagecoach travelers. The 10-room building retains 80 percent of its original wood. The state purchased the building in 1955, did some cosmetic renovations, and Travelers Rest is now one of several tourists attractions in the Toccoa area. Others include Toccoa Falls, Tugaloo State Park and Tallulah Gorge and Falls.

The newly dedicated church of St. Mary’s with its expanded seating can now comfortably accommodate its own faith community and visitors who come to enjoy Toccoa, the beautiful.