Telegraph photo by DEAN SHALHOUP Nashua Soup Kitchen & Shelter executive director Mike Reinke describes some of the work going on in the basement of the former Sacred Heart School to "Spring Street Forward" campaign chairman Joe Bates, left, and treasurer Jerry Ryan.

NASHUA – The ink had barely dried on the paperwork conveying a plot of land at Spring and Eldredge streets to Nashua’s burgeoning Irish Catholic community when crews of dedicated construction workers started working night and day on a new Catholic school for children of Irish immigrants.

That was more than 125 years ago, a time when construction equipment consisted mostly of men’s muscles, strong backs, a couple of work horses and maybe one or two steam-operated machines. But the crews, knowing how important adequate schools and classrooms were for their community’s children, managed to complete the project in just nine months.

The kind of civic-mindedness that put the children of mainly poor, newly arrived Irish immigrants in brand-new classrooms in record time holds true for the property all these years later, Mike Reinke, Nashua Soup Kitchen & Shelter executive director, said Thursday.

“This was built for low income immigrants back then, and today, it will again be serving folks in need in our community,” Reinke said, referring to the historic former Sacred Heart School at 35 Spring St.

Reinke was among about a dozen people who gathered at the building Thursday for what he called a “hard hat” event, a brief program that marked the official kickoff of a sweeping renovation project that, when complete, will give the old place a new lease on life as an emergency shelter for single men, single women and families.

Telegraph photo by DEAN SHALHOUP A banner announces the coming of the Nashua Soup Kitchen & Shelter's new shelter in the former Sacred Heart School on Spring Street.

Plans also include a community resource center, featuring public spaces for daycare, community meetings, support groups and adult learning.

The Soup Kitchen & Shelter’s acquisition of the building was made possible by a 40-year lease the agency entered with the Manchester-based Roman Catholic Diocese of New Hampshire, the owner of the property for decades.

The agency undertook a fundraising campaign called “Spring Street Forward” to support the renovation project, and was assisted in part by a Nashua Community Development Block Grant.

Among the major tasks to date that construction crews have undertaken is the recent removal – in many parts and pieces – of the “heating plant,” an aged, giant boiler that heated not only the school, but St. Patrick’s Church next door.

The Rev. Michael Kerper, pastor of the church, said work crews at the start of the renovations had to separate the utilities, which for some reason were originally designed to serve both buildings.

The church itself opened to parishioners on Christmas Day 1909, Kerper said, after being under construction for nearly a decade. As they awaited the church’s completion, clergy held services and celebrated Mass on the fourth floor of the school next door.

As for the completion of the current renovation project, Reinke said the hope is to have it ready for occupancy by the end of 2021.

The project comes just five years after another milestone for the Soup Kitchen & Shelter – the opening of its current “state-of-the-art facility providing hot meals … and food pantry” in the former VFW Post 483 building at 2 Quincy St.

Now, Reinke said, the agency is “proud and grateful to announce that 35 Spring St. will serve as the new location for our emergency shelter program, the next step in providing comprehensive emergency services to the single adults and families experiencing homelessness in our community.”

By the numbers, the opening of 35 Spring St. will allow the agency to double its current overnight shelter space for single men, triple the space for single women, and nearly triple its space for families, according to its plans.

For more information about the agency and its projects, go to www.nsks.org.

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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