Origins of the "Hidden Brook"

by Steve Steadman

Recently, the Thursday evening candlelight prayer group adopted the new name?"The Hidden Brook"?reflecting both the spiritual potential as well as the physical reality of the Church of the Good Shepherd's location.

In 1979, when I first arrived at Good Shepherd, a major transformation in the ministry of CGS was underway. Rand was occupied by a Christian community of parishioners known as "Tree House." The Parish House as well as much of the Sunday School space had been occupied by the Multi-service Center, and there was a Hidden Brook Nursery School, organized by the church members. With the coming of the Rev. Roger Moulton as the new Rector, all this changed. The nursery school space became occupied by the Palfrey Preschool, which was an independent school. (This space in turn is now occupied by the Caterpillars to Butterflies daycare center.)

There also had been several troubling floods up through the drain in the men's room, which Carl Queander had to deal with. The area at the back of the Rand property was also almost a swamp. Rumors around the church at the time indicated that there was a "hidden brook" under the church that had given rise to the name of the nursery school.

On the advice of Ed Nielsen, a young architect and parishioner at the time who was responsible for the energy-saving measures on the property (storm windows in the church, ceiling fans, and insulating the Parish Hall), I checked with the Town engineering department. Their records indeed showed that there was a brook that had flowed down the hill from the golf course between Russell Avenue and Bates Road/Garfield Street. It had been diverted into a buried culvert, which then made a right-angle turn behind Rand under the driveway of Rand out to the street, where it connected with the storm water drainage system. Obviously, originally this brook flowed right through the church property!

It turned out that the part of the culvert under the Rand property had collapsed, so that the water was now forced to find an alternative path. The Town replaced the pipe, which as I remember is three to four feet in diameter?a major undertaking. A new driveway was put in and a load of topsoil was spread over the back yard of Rand, as the soil had been thoroughly disturbed. This made the area much more favorable for gardening. I would guess that this all occurred about 1982.

So, indeed there is a "hidden brook" associated with the Church of the Good Shepherd.