City Eyes Blog

Tag: Gary

  • Gary Church Revisited

    Gary Church Revisited

    Here are a few more shots of one of my favorite places in the area. I’ve been busy at the paper with all of the floods going on in the area, but a forced detour due to the closing of a highway and a bit of lucky downtime, I managed to stop by to take a few shots.
    In the rain, the church takes on a whole new mood. Water floods in from the ceiling and collects on the floor of the once great church. The brickwork is exposed where the water hits, dirt washed away. Water runs down the limestone pillars. The pounding, pouring rain gave the church a completely new feeling, almost as if it were alive again. It was absolutely beautiful.

    I took a photo or two of the sanctuary before deciding to explore the rest of the building again. I made my way into another room and made my way up some stairs.

    I climbed up into the church bell tower in order to get a shot from above. I knew that I probably wouldn’t be in the area next time it was raining so hard so I figured I’d capture the moment.

    On my way down, I stopped by a room that I’ve always liked. The floor was an inch deep with water. In the winter, the floor of this room is often coated with ice. Today, water gathered.

    Finally, the result of exploring a very wet abandoned church:

  • Gary Indiana Exploration 08-31-08

    Ok, as you guys know, I went out to the most abandoned city in America again on Saturday. Said I’d post a few photos. As always, more photos and larger versions available at my flickr stream at http://www.flickr.com/photos/cityeyes
    Here they are:

    A shutter, busted out from either wear through time or a vandal, sits in the center of the hallway of an abandoned apartment complex connected to one of the most famous theaters of the 1950’s.

    Stage lights litter the floor near the exit to the theater. I’m surprised they haven’t been broken, but many explorers that come to this area of town are dedicated enough to leave things where they were found and smart enough to watch their step – you never know when you’ll hit some rotten wood and burst through the floor.

    The main hall of a disused auditorium. This is actually the first time that I’ve visited this area. The actual “auditorium” part of the building is completely overgrown with weeds. The stairs of the auditorium were carved out of ornate limestone. It almost seems as if someone had swept them because they were oddly clean considering the condition of the building that they were in.

    Obligatory Peeling Paint Shot. I don’t usually like to take these, but the lighting in this room was too good to pass up. I also couldn’t get over how green that paint was.

    A gigantic pile of clothes sits among many others in the abandoned warehouse. I ran into another explorer on the same day and he filled me in on the whole situation – apparently some woman had promised to fly all of these articles of clothing over to third world countries and instead ditched it all in abandoned buildings across the city. Sneaky. Equally messy – piles of paper littered the floors in what seemed to be a storage room. Receipts from the 50’s on are present in this room.

    Andrew sees the light – the dust from the floor of the old warehouse highlights two beams of light which happen to fall right on my friend. In another room, a door sits – signatures dotting the entire surface. Some of them even date back to the 50’s.

  • Abandoned Church Exploration pt.2

    I loved the place so much that I went back again. Unfortunately, it took me forever to write about it, so I might be a bit fuzzy on the details. More exploration to come! Here are some photos of the abandoned church, as well as explanation.

    The rooms in the church show so much decay, it’s incredible. This particular room was part of the “school” section of the building. The ceiling had fallen in and there was a single chair left. Further in, evidence of looters. The ceilings were torn out and stripped of all valuable materials.

    I climbed to the top of the church as high as I could go and came upon a pile of cinderblocks against the wall. Luckily, they had been securely placed (or frozen), so they held my weight without collapsing. I lifted myself up through a hole in the roof onto a rusty old catwalk and found myself at the top of the steeple in the main sanctuary area (more photos of that on the post before this one). It was pretty high up and I was nervous, so I got down there pretty quickly.

    Some of the rooms had some pretty interesting graffiti in them.

    The floors in some of the rooms were completely covered in a layer of ice. Others were covered ankle deep with clothes and toys.

    Finally, we ventured down into the basement. We hadn’t thought of bringing flashlights, so we were navigating using the light of our cell phones. It was an ominous place. I found a piano from the 1800’s, but couldn’t get a shot of it due to the poor lighting. I was able to get a quick shot of a hole in the ceiling.

    The last place we visited seemed to be where the fire started – an abandoned bookstore in the storefront area  of the church. There were so many neat things there. We found a poster announcing the original release of Stephen King’s “Carrie” as well as a giant poster of “The Fonz” and a Mork and Mindy book. I also found a stack of resumes from the 70’s. I might post them – important information blanked out – in the future.

    More exploration to come.

  • Ruins of an abandoned church – Gary, Indiana

    CMC was shut down in the 70’s due to a lack of attendance and suffered a fire in ’97 (thanks to Corby for the correction!). To this day,  stands in the streets of Gary, Indiana as a relic of the past – the vast sanctuary, shadowy hallways, and decaying innards a testament to the ravages of time.

    After about three minutes of driving around a bit aimlessly, I saw a spire above a few old looking buildings about a street away from me. I navigated my way over and found myself at the base of one of the biggest and most beautiful abandoned buildings that I’d ever seen. The second I ducked into a side door, I knew that I’d found it. To the left, a stage littered with all sorts of clothing and wreckage. To the right, a small room leading into a huge sanctuary.

    I left after snapping a few photos and returned later with Elise. Here are the results:

    First, we hit the sanctuary. It was beautiful, cold, and quiet. Snow drifted in through holes in the   roof and settled on the brick floors.

    Following that, we made our way to other areas of the building. The theater, long destroyed, showed no sign of snow, but the upstairs auditorium was completely coated with a thin dusting.

    On our way down, we saw a makeshift living room set up. I assume someone moved this stuff for a photo or something, but I’d like to think a crazy man lives here in the summer.

    Even long abandoned and freezing cold, animals make this beautiful building their home.

    I plan on getting back there as soon as possible to take more photos – we had to give up eventually because the sun was quickly fading and our fingers were completely numb from the cold. I plan on exploring more of Gary with my camera soon in the future, as well as the surrounding areas.

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