Missouriland

Words and photos by REUBEN HEMMER

In 1927, a Franciscan missionary from Poland named Bronislaus Luszcz was sent to the foothills of the Ozarks to help build an infirmary.

Called upon by John J. Glennon, archbishop of St. Louis at the time, Luszcz came to the Midwest with his fellow missionaries to turn an abandoned convent into a place of care.

While clearing an area for a chapel, Luszcz hung a portrait of the “Black Madonna of Cz stochowa” above an altar. Inspired by pilgrimages he’d witnessed growing up in Poland, he began building his own grottoes and shrines around the portrait using locally mined Missouri tiff rock. This in turn inspired pilgrims to come worship at the shrine and chapel.

Luszcz devoted the next 23 years of his life to consistently adding more material into the shrine until he died of a heat stroke in 1960 while working on his creation. The resultant Black Madonna Shrine and Grottos (100 St. Josephs Hill Road in Pacific Missouri 636-93 -5361 theblackmadonnashrine.org) is open to the public 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. seven days a week. n

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