Stories, legends, myths - Santa Fe Spiral Staircase

This story is part of a series of articles about various stories, myths, superstitions, legends, which are in one way or another related to wood. Maybe you've heard of them, maybe not. By some mysterious mechanism, such stories always draw us in and make us return to them, retelling them with equal pleasure. One such story - and a famous one at that - is the spiral staircase of the Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA. Its fame comes primarily from the fact that it is built without a central supporting pillar, as if it were floating in the air. It is said to have been made in a very short time, by a single person who used only simple tools to build it. It is made entirely of wood, and this wood is not local. No nails or adhesives were used for the joints. All this is an invitation to discover the story of the mysterious staircase.

Chapel of the nuns of the Loretto Order

In 1848, the city of Santa Fe, which belonged to Mexico, came into the possession of the United States after a war. The population was very diverse, with all kinds of faiths, so Bishop Jean Baptist Lamy was commissioned to spread Catholicism in the area. To do this he contacts various orders, but the only ones who respond are the nuns of the Sisters of Loretto. They come and start spreading the Catholic faith, even setting up a school.

With money raised from various donations, the nuns are thinking of building a chapel. The bishop gave the task to the French architect Antoine Mouly, who had worked on the restoration of the Sainte Chapelle inside the Palace of Justice in central Paris. He decided to use this chapel as a model for the new building and began work in 1873. The Baroque-style chapel was completed in 1878, but Mouly died in the meantime, leaving the access to the choir loft unfinished. And so the legend begins.

The stranger who built the ladder with a saw and a teepee

The nuns tried to solve the problem, but all the carpenters called in said it was impossible to make a ladder in such a narrow place. Then they decided to pray to St Joseph, the father of Jesus, who had been a carpenter and was the spiritual patron of carpenters. They prayed nine days, and on the tenth day a stranger appeared. He told them he would make the ladder, provided he was left to work alone. The stranger had with him a saw, a tee and that was it.

In just six months the stranger managed to build a fantastic wooden staircase. It was helical in shape, with no central pillar, no nails and no adhesives. He used only wooden dowels for the joints. The staircase is 6 m high and rotates 2 full 360 degrees. The wood used is not from the area and to make the mystery complete, the stranger disappeared immediately after finishing the work, without waiting for payment. All of this fuelled the legend that the staircase was built by St Joseph himself. The fact that the staircase has exactly 33 steps - the Christic age - further strengthened the legend.

A scale that continues to be studied by specialists

The staircase was built somewhere between 1877 and 1881, the exact date is unknown. It originally had no balustrade and did not lean against any walls or pillars. In the meantime a balustrade and a supporting pillar were added. Many woodworkers and physicists have studied the staircase and found explanations for the perfect balance of the 33 identical steps, but they all admit that it is very difficult to make such a staircase even now, with all the modern machinery, let alone then, with rudimentary tools.

In our time the phenomenon has been studied by various historians and specialists. At one time, in the 1970s, it was thought that the whole thing was built by a Neamese builder, but the theory was not supported by evidence. More recently, Mary Jean Straw Cook, a local-born historian, was able to find documents proving that the staircase was made by French craftsman Francois-Jean Rochas, who later settled in America. From the evidence found, it would appear that the staircase was built in France and only mounted in the chapel. This would explain why the wood used is not found in the area. But there are many other questions that have yet to be answered and which continue to entertain the legend.

The story of the Santa Fe staircase has fired the imagination of many generations. It became so well known that it was even the subject of a hit movie.

Now the Loretto Chapel is no longer in operation, having been declared a museum. But it is still used for weddings.