Judith Westlund Rosbe

St. Gabriel's Episcopal Church was founded in 1871, when Adm. Andrew Harwood decided to retire in Marion, Massachusetts, and fulfill a promise that he had made to the archangel Gabriel after surviving a fierce storm at sea. Initially a church for Marion's summer residents, it became a year-round church in 1896. In 1899, the national press corps lined up outside the church to glimpse the wedding of the country's most famous journalist, Richard Harding Davis, to artist Cecil Clark. Beginning in 1913, the chapel was enhanced with 11 stained-glass windows designed for the church by Charles J. Connick, the most famous American stained-glass artist of the 20th century. The church was later expanded after the acquisition of adjacent land and the construction of a parish hall, church school buildings, and a new sanctuary. In the 1950s, the church began having full-time rectors. Today, the church has 300 family members on its rolls and will celebrate 150 years in 2021.

In The Late Nineteenth Century, America's new railroads flooded Marion with extravagant cargo: the rich and famous. For the likes of Mark Twain, Henry James and President Grover Cleveland, whose home here was known as the "summer White House," Marion became a treasured sanctuary from city life. Teeming with prosperity and the blossoming arts, this hamlet offered a setting so breathtaking that it inspired some of the world's foremost creative minds. Encouraged by The Century Magazine editor Richard Watson Gilder, prominent artists, architects, writers and celebrities flocked to Marion. Also frequented by Academy Award-winning actress Ethel Barrymore, it was here that Charles Dana Gibson sketched his iconic "Gibson Girl." Whether following First Lady Frances Cleveland's trendsetting fashion or the well-publicized wedding of Cecil Clark and Richard Harding Davis, the eyes of America were firmly planted on Marion's sparkling shores and glittering guests.