St. Alphonsus Hall - Boston, MA

St. Alphonsus Hall opened on February 19, 1900 and is in the Mission Hill neighborhood in Boston, Massachusetts. It was named after Alphonsus Maria de Liguori, the founder of the Redemptionist order and was built as part of the Mission Church Complex, which consisted of a grammar school, a convent, a mission school, and the Mission Church Basilica. It was designed by architect F. Joseph Untersee, and constructed with fireproof materials like brick, and Roxbury puddingstone, a common local stone quarried nearby. 

The opening dedication of the hall took place on February 26, 1900, and consisted of some public speakers and performances by the Mission Church Choir and the Boston Festival Orchestra. The following day, Feb 27, they held the first play at the theater. It was a one-act play called “Snobson’s Stag Party” and was followed by some vaudeville performances.According to an early newspaper article on the hall, its function was to be “a clubhouse for the young men of the parish.” The building consisted of the theater, a library, a lunch counter, a billiard room, and a two-lane bowling alley in the basement. They used it for many activities like musical performances, Catholic Youth sporting events and many social club gatherings.

Mission Church held a yearly performance of the play “Pilate’s Daughter” around Easter in the theater until 1965. Mission Hill Community Theatre used the theater until the early 1980s as a playhouse. Some plays that were performed at St. Alphonsus over the years include “Hello, Dolly”, “Guys and Dolls”, “The Odd Couple” and “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” 

The hall fell into disrepair and Massachusetts State Rep. Kevin Fitzgerald, who was a lifelong resident of the area, formed the “Committee to Re-Open St. Alphonsus Hall” in 1984. Fitzgerald, along with the Boston Committee, Shawmut Bank, UMass Boston, and local residents established a nonprofit organization to restore the hall. They estimated the restoration to cost $1.5 million. Unfortunately, this never came to pass, and the building was ultimately sold to a developer who plans on demolishing the building and replacing it with a housing complex called “Basilica Court.” They gutted the interior of the theater to the bare brick walls soon after the building was sold.