Our Lady of Clearwater: The Marian Image on the Seminole Finance Corporation Windows

Clearwater, Florida. A two-storey office building stood at 21649 US Highway 19 North, just north of Drew Street. Its walls were bronze, smoked, reflective glass. The stain on the south wall was older than the crowds. A 1994 Florida Department of Transportation photo shows it, partly hidden behind palm trees. Owner Michael G. Krizmanich said the stains "were present even then," when he bought the building.

Tuesday, December 17, 1996. A customer of the Seminole Finance Corporation noticed it and reported it to a local TV station. By the following morning, hundreds of believers had made a pilgrimage to U.S. 19 and Drew Street.

What they saw spread across about a dozen panes. UPI called it "rainbow-hued," like "a stained-glass portrait of Mary." It towered 60 feet over the parking lot. It was featureless. Yet to many it looked like "a woman bowed in solemn prayer," veiled, her head lowered. People wept. They knelt. Pastor Mary Stewart of Tampa's Campaigning for Jesus Christian Center felt drawn to her knees. "I believe it is here to get people's attention that we are living in the last days," she said. Not everyone saw her. "I see the reflections, but I don't see it," said one visitor.

Thousands filled the lot on December 18. By Christmas, nearly half a million were expected, from North America, South America and Europe. Flowers, candles and handwritten notes piled up beneath the glass. Clearwater police put eight officers on a "Miracle Management" unit and kept pedestrians off the eight-lane highway. By February 1997, about 600,000 had come. Over the years, an estimated 1.5 million.

January 19, 1997. Wieslaw Skowronek, 44, a Polish immigrant who spoke little English, was arrested for trespass at the site. An officer gave him a "knee spike" to the abdomen. He died of a ruptured pancreas in the police car.

Architects examined the windows from inside and out. Authorities had "no explanation as to what caused the image." Gary P. Posner of Tampa Bay Skeptics went looking for one. Chemist Charles Roberts, with 40 years of glass analysis, blamed water deposits and weathering, a reaction "such as is commonly seen in old bottles," perhaps fed by a broken sprinkler head. Stephen Hughes of the National Glass Association called such stains "not at all uncommon." Pat Johnson of City Glass & Mirror made similar images with oil and water.

The Diocese of St. Petersburg urged "a great deal of healthy skepticism." It called the image a "naturally explained phenomenon" and opened no formal investigation. But anything that brought people to prayer, it said, was good.

May 1997. A vandal sprayed liquid that streaked the image. In June, heavy thunderstorms washed the streaks away, and some pilgrims said the image had healed itself. In July 1998 the building was leased to Shepherds of Christ, a ministry whose locutionist, Rita Ring, had reported a message from Mary authenticating the image. A cedar crucifix by Texas sculptor Felix Avalos rose beside it. In 2000 the ministry bought the building and named it Our Lady of Clearwater.

March 1, 2004. Ball bearings from a slingshot shattered the top three panes. The head and veil were gone. Kyle Maskell, 18, confessed in May. His anger, he said, was about his living situation, not religion. The headless image still stands, and a small prayer group meets there daily. Believers compared it to Guadalupe, Lourdes and Fátima. Sceptics saw weathered glass, and a mind that finds faces.