As many of you can most likely recall, EllwoodCity.org’s previous journalist, Jonathon Cortez, posted months earlier bringing almost constant updates about St. Agatha’s destruction in order to build a new CVS Pharmacy; he even wrote a lengthy opinion piece about his thoughts of it.
He stated that he believed the destruction of St. Agatha was a mistake, mainly because it was one of the oldest buildings in Ellwood and it should be protected as such.
He emphasized that there are other similar pharmacies in the area and a Rite Aid across the street from the proposed CVS, so it seemed a bit pointless to be adding a new one, especially in the place of a historic building. He even compromised saying that if they must do something with the building a good alternative “would have been to get a business that would have used St. Agatha as is or used the materials to make a building with similar architecture to preserve the look of the block.”
Sadly, the demolition of the church has long been completed and a CVS has been slowly taking its place.
After months of constructing the brand new building, and as long as all goes according to plan, CVS officials have scheduled the store’s opening date to September 18, 2016.
St. Agatha before demolition
Pharmacopoia is the new organized religion in America.
Check the statistics on this and see I am correct.
DuhMericans love this crap…look at Cranberry ugly
strip malls the same corporate chains that are everywhere
and cheaply built homes in cookie cutter subdivisions;
and most sheeple think it’s just dandy!
Nice writing on EC.ORG thanks for your work. PEACE
Jonathan Cortez rocks!
I love how you make it sound like CVS is ISIS ravaging and pillaging through dear Ellwood. They legally bought the land that the Church sits on and have every right to do whatever they want with it.
Gino, you’re right. And frankly, if all the people who are upset about losing the church would have actually been attending church the last several years, the diocese wouldn’t have closed it. Just because it’s old doesn’t make it historically valuable.
I will NEVER shop there! St Agatha Church should have been declared a historical landmark. What is the Ellwood City historical scoiety doing for the good of Ellwood City?….Nothing!
Cvs took a building that had been neglected and a city block that was in ruins and made something of it. No one worried about the church for the years it laid rotting away.
As one who was raised in St. Agatha’s church, but moved away decades ago, I was very saddened to hear of it’s closing and eventually watch as the beautiful building was turned to rubble. But the true loss for Ellwood City is not that of a historical building. The true loss for Ellwood City is the body of believers who can no longer support 2 buildings. It is not CVS’s fault that the church was for sale. A big company like CVS has surely done its research to understand the viability of building a new store, directly across from a competition drug store.