Yordan Kovatchki made it look easy.
At 64, he moved gracefully toward the high places of Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna, whether by scaling ladders or climbing scaffolding or balancing on wooden beams that serve as aerial walkways in a dusty hollow, hidden above the ornate ceiling.
Yordan Kovatchki, director of facilities and plant engineering at OLV Charities, climbs the ladder to the uppermost level inside the dome, in which a steel skeleton holds up the interior dome from above, at Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
Joined by Buffalo News photographer Derek Gee, I followed Kovatchki, director of facilities for OLV Charities, the network of service organizations that serve as a 21st century legacy to Father Nelson Baker. A century after the marble landmark was built, OLV has started a sweeping restoration whose initial goal is stopping decades of creeping water damage, often in places unseen by visitors.
I was there both for my job, and on behalf of a little kid who watched the shrine go up from the orphanage Baker ran across the street.
To Kovatchki, the basilica sparks reflections on great European places of worship. He came here years ago as a refugee from Bulgaria “with my wife and two kids and two suitcases.” As a young man, Kovatchki said, he was on the Bulgarian national cycling team, and his agility offers echoes of those skills.
The intricate dome high above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna, Wednesday, July 27, 2022.
He sees his willingness to go up high, into stunning and unseen areas that provide a protective shell around the sanctuary, as a job imperative that demands some climbing chops: “I have to know what I’m talking about,” he said.
Kovatchki went step-by-step along narrow planks, reached by scaling a ladder in the northeast tower. He later brought us toward the interior peak of the familiar dome, access gained by scaling temporary scaffolding against the marble walls, then by climbing another ladder to a lower roof and an entry point so tiny that Derek could barely make it in with his cameras.
Once there, surrounded by a mind-bending spiderweb of beams in this great dome that envelopes a smaller dome that holds the altar, you take a breath and really start to climb.
Roofers inspect and patch the copper roof atop Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna on Wednesday, July 27, 2022.
We timed our visit to coincide with an annual celebration of the fabled Baker's outreach toward the hurting, the work his many advocates hope will someday lift him into sainthood. For this week's upcoming "Father Baker Weekend," artists have been invited to set up easels and paint images of the basilica.
There will be a Bobby Militello jazz Mass at 4 p.m. Saturday, and a noon Mass on Sunday in Baker’s honor, while a “penny drop” – which recalls how Baker welcomed the tiniest donations to help build the basilica – will be held all day Sunday.
John Phillips was one of the last people alive to have known Monsignor Nelson Baker, the fabled Catholic priest who built a “city of charity” that provided a home over the years to thousands of
OLV spokesman John Pitts said his organization is also seeking help with what Pitts calls “history harvests.” Baker's funeral was in 1936, and OLV administrators are keenly aware that John Phillips, who died in 2020, is believed to have been the last of the "Baker boys" – orphans with direct memory of the old priest.
Archivists are looking for generational tales of Baker or children for whom he intervened, meaning I was there last week as both a journalist and a contributor.
Orphans at Faker Baker's orphanage complex, in the courtyard by St. Joseph's, 1920s.
My father was a "Baker boy." He and his brothers spent much of their childhoods in the orphanage, including some of the time when the basilica was going up. They arrived when they were small, after their mother died, which explains why the 1930 census lists my dad as a 12-year-old “inmate” at St. Joseph's, where younger boys were housed.
Around Buffalo, while I often hear how “we’ll take you to Father Baker’s” was a parental threat routinely used on many baby boomer contemporaries, the opposite was true around our house.
Whenever we drove the Thruway, we would see the basilica and its trumpeting angels rising from the trees of Lackawanna, and my mother would say in a no-big-deal voice: “That’s where your father used to live.”
My dad remembered Father Baker. He did not pretend he knew him well, but he recalled Baker's routine presence when the boys were in the courtyard or attending Mass or singing in a chorus.
The view from inside the dome of Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna on Wednesday, July 27, 2022.
While many of the stories were hardly nostalgic – fistfights, he used to say, were a survival currency – he always seemed grateful for what the place gave him, when he had nothing else.
He went from the orphanage to stay briefly with his own unpredictable father, then quickly into Civilian Conservation Corps work camps of the Great Depression. Before long, he was drafted into World War II, and by the time he returned to Buffalo, he had a good idea of what matters and what does not.
Columnist Sean Kirst's father, James Dorsey Kirst, center, in an image believed to have been taken at Father Baker's orphanage.
For decades he moved coal for Niagara Mohawk, and I find myself realizing that my father – like so many orphans at Father Baker’s – somehow forged a solid life from abandonment and potential chaos, and I know that he saw it as a result of the old priest's work.
So my dad felt a kinship to the basilica. We witnessed it when my parents would take us there to walk the grounds that in a sense were as close as we came to a grandparent’s old house, or when we joined my dad at an emotional reunion of gray-haired orphans more than 35 years ago.
Yordan Kovatchki, director of facilities and plant engineering at OLV, climbs the ladder to the uppermost level inside the dome, in which a steel skeleton holds up the interior dome from above, within a separate steel frame holding up the exterior dome high above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
For all those reasons, my thoughts kept returning to my dad – a curious guy who never feared high places – as we made our way to a vantage point behind the walls, high above the altar, where you could see tiny worshippers, far below.
“Don’t worry,” said Kovatchki, who wore a headlamp in the darkness. “They don’t know we’re here.”
The way back required walking along thin beams that provide catwalks above the plaster ceiling. Generations of workers have gone that way to change or fix the lights, often leaving behind ancient packaging that reminded me of debris climbers leave on Everest, because it is a challenge of space and balance to bring it down.
Yordan Kovatchki, director of facilities and plant engineering at OLV, stops at the foot of a walkway used to change the lightbulbs above the sanctuary deep inside a crawlspace above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
A week or two earlier, as prelude to the tour, I had met with the Rev. David LiPuma, pastor and rector at the basilica; David Kersten, the top guy at OLV Charities; and several construction principals in the restoration.
They recalled how a 1916 fire that damaged the old St. Patrick’s Church accelerated Baker's vision for a basilica that would be – in the words of chief designer Emile Uhlrich – a "national expression of gratitude toward Our Lady of Victory," whose medal hangs from a chain around my neck.
It took five years to build. Even in a greater Buffalo community that is a global treasury of landmarks, Tom Kujawa, an architect whose Schneider Architectural Services is handling the job, called the basilica "an architectural gem" involving many elaborate works of art – including a marble rendering of Baker, surrounded by orphans.
A steel skeleton holds up the interior dome from above, inside another steel frame holding up the exterior dome high above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
A century of attempts at repair did not stop water damage at too many points, Kujawa said. OLV is embarked on a campaign to find grants or donations for a long-term restoration, which immediately involves about $1.5 million in new copper roofs and extensive repairs to a crumbling storm gutter system, done with a boost from the National Fund for Sacred Places.
As Kovatchki climbed, he pointed out workers from Weaver Metal and Roofing, who were "tied off" as they moved in and out from restoring the gutters, while a wary falcon kept an eye on their progress.
Our objective was different. We were moving toward the highest point of the dome’s interior, which required climbing a sequence of metal ladders in a hidden space worshippers cannot see, roughly 200 feet above the marble floor.
That meant rising through a vast crisscross of metal beams, like the heart of an ancient dirigible, where the only exterior light came from small hatches, here and there. Finally, Kovatchki stepped onto the highest landing, where one last ladder rose into shadow.
I climbed it. I was thinking of 1920s orphans, in faded uniforms, staring up as fearless workers shaped this place out of the sky. After a few steps, I reached into the darkness until my hand struck a solid point, and I said out loud, with gratitude:
Dad, we touched the top.
Sean Kirst is a columnist with The Buffalo News. Email him at skirst@buffnews.com.
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Born in Dunkirk, a son, grandson and great-grandson of Buffalonians, I've been an Upstate journalist for more than 48 years. As a kid, I learned quiet lives are often monumental. I still try to honor that simple lesson, as a columnist.
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A sweeping restoration is underway at Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna. Buffalo News columnist Sean Kirst and Ch…
Yordan Kovatchki, director of facilities and plant engineering at OLV Charities, climbs the ladder to the uppermost level inside the dome, in which a steel skeleton holds up the interior dome from above, at Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
The intricate dome high above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna, Wednesday, July 27, 2022.
Roofers inspect and patch the copper roof atop Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna on Wednesday, July 27, 2022.
Orphans at Faker Baker's orphanage complex, in the courtyard by St. Joseph's, 1920s.
The view from inside the dome of Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna on Wednesday, July 27, 2022.
Yordan Kovatchki, director of facilities and plant engineering at OLV, climbs the ladder to the uppermost level inside the dome, in which a steel skeleton holds up the interior dome from above, within a separate steel frame holding up the exterior dome high above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
Yordan Kovatchki, director of facilities and plant engineering at OLV, stops at the foot of a walkway used to change the lightbulbs above the sanctuary deep inside a crawlspace above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
A steel skeleton holds up the interior dome from above, inside another steel frame holding up the exterior dome high above Our Lady of Victory National Shrine and Basilica in Lackawanna.
Columnist Sean Kirst's father, James Dorsey Kirst, center, in an image believed to have been taken at Father Baker's orphanage.
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