A not-for-profit organization is raising money to restore the Kawartha Park Chapel in Selwyn Township and turn it into a community meeting place ahead of its 100th birthday.
“The first goal is to preserve the building, and the second goal is to make a meeting place where our community can come together,” says Martha Hunt, the treasurer and a director of the Hiawatha Chapel Association.
Kawartha Park Chapel is located at 2488 Hiawatha Lane, on the west side of Stoney Lake in the township’s Smith Ward. The wooden chapel was built in August 1925 over a two-week period on a piece of land donated by Richard Birdsall Rogers, the engineer who built the Peterborough Lift Lock and who owned a cottage on Hiawatha Lane.
The structure incorporates gothic revival elements including lancet windows, a gable roof, a porch with an awning, and the belfry with a bell that was added in 1929 through a donation from the CNR.
Sometimes known as the Church in the Wild Woods, the chapel operated as a non-denominational Protestant church from 1925 until around 2010, when it ceased operations to a lack of attendance.
While Hunt says she and fellow members of the Kawartha Park Cottagers Association have been thinking about restoring the chapel for close to a decade, the challenge was determining who owned the property.
Once they discovered it to be the Presbyterian Church of Canada, however, they incorporated the Hiawatha Chapel Association as a non-profit organization and were transferred the title with the Church paying all the legal costs.
While Hunt notes the building’s “bones are really good,” some of the needed repairs include replacing rotting floorboards, making the footing sturdier, rebuilding the deck and steps, reinforcing the bell tower, putting in window screens, and replacing the shingles with a metal roof.
“We’re not changing the building at all — we are just trying to preserve it,” Hunt says.
The Hiawatha Chapel Association successfully worked to get the Kawartha Park Chapel designated as a heritage property by Selwyn Township council in 2024.
According to an evaluation done by the heritage committee, “the property is a unique and important example of a non-denominational cottage community church erected in the early twentieth century” and “has direct associations with the development of the cottage community of Kawartha Park.”
The Hiawatha Chapel Association is aiming to raise $125,000 to support the construction and continued maintenance of the chapel and property. Currently, the charity is just shy of $50,000 in pledges.
“We’re very hopeful that we’ll be able to get the project started this spring,” says Hunt. “Once cottagers start arriving and see the work being done, they will get excited and feel the energy.”
“I hope that enough money comes in that we can get the project going this spring or summer, and then the big event will be the birthday party in August.”
Following the construction and the centennial celebration, Hunt says the hope is for the chapel to be used in any way the community sees fit, on a purely not-for-profit basis.
“It would be nice to have a building where we could put on an art show, have yoga classes, or host a book club,” she reflects.
“It’s close to (Otonabee Conservation’s Heber Rogers Wildlife Area) so it would be great to have trails coming down to the chapel, and people can sit and rest (inside). I envision historical photos or maybe like a museum, it will have some artifacts from early cottage days.”
Since the chapel has no plumbing and limited parking, it wouldn’t be ideal for major events, though Hunt sees it as a place that would be accessible to all.
“We’re hoping once it’s done, the doors will be open every day for people to wander in and just look or rest,” Hunt says. “Hopefully we will have some interesting things for them to check out, or maybe it’s just a place to have a cup of coffee with a friend. We’re hoping that we can find a way to open the doors every morning.”
For more information, visit www.kawarthaparkmeetingplace.ca or join the Kawartha Park Meeting Place Facebook group.
Donations can be made at CanadaHelps or by e-transfer to kawarthaparkmeetingplace@gmail.com.
