Marquette's St. Peter Cathedral is nearing the end of a two-year, $2.6 million restoration of its bell tower, with scaffolding removal set to begin the week of Monday, Oct. 5.

Father Brandon Oman, the cathedral's pastor, announced the project's completion at a Tuesday, Sept. 29, press conference. The date marked the anniversary of the cathedral's dedication, 145 years after its cornerstone was laid in 1881.

The project focused on the uppermost 40 feet of the tower, a section added in the late 1930s after a fire destroyed part of the original structure on Nov. 3, 1935. The cathedral's official history says restoration after the fire began in 1936 and the rebuilt cathedral was completed in September 1938. That addition was built with brick and terracotta veneer painted to resemble the cathedral's original sandstone. Decades of Upper Peninsula freeze-thaw cycles had wrecked the brick from the inside out, according to Upper Michigan's Source.

Lead mason Bill Klein of Ram Construction described the damage at the press conference. Stones weighing 200 to 300 pounds had shifted as much as eight inches outward and could be pulled from the wall by hand. The backup brick behind them had completely deteriorated.

Workers removed and replaced more than 30 tons of brick and rubble, the Mining Journal reported. The scope included waterproofing the bell tower, repairing cracks, resetting limestone and sandstone, tuckpointing mortar and restoring the gable entrance.

Klein hand-carved 10,000 pounds of large boulders for reuse on the cathedral. Sandstone was donated from the old Marquette Quarry site, now the Shiras Hills area of South Marquette. Stones there, some the size of cars, were broken apart on-site and hauled up the scaffolding by elevator 500 pounds at a time.

Klein also said the project incorporated salvaged stones from a demolished St. Andrews Church in Cincinnati. Klein said Bishop Frederic Baraga, who founded the parish in 1853, came from Cincinnati, giving the stones an added historical connection. The Diocese of Marquette says Baraga was consecrated a bishop in Cincinnati in 1853 before serving as bishop in the Upper Peninsula.

The work drew community interest. Klein said residents carried home rubble as keepsakes, emptying "pallets in 45 minutes."

Ram Construction used members of Bricklayers and Allied Craftworkers Local #2 from the Marquette area. Adam Saari, the union's field representative, said the local trained workers over the winter through its apprenticeship program to handle the specialized masonry.

John O'Connor, a Local #2 member who worked on the restoration, has a personal tie to the building. His sister, Megan O'Connor, got married at St. Peter Cathedral. She now serves as executive director of stewardship and development for the Diocese of Marquette and helped raise the $2.6 million for the project.

The front entrance of the cathedral has been fenced off for more than three years during the work. It will reopen once the scaffolding is removed, a process WZMQ reported could take several more weeks. Facility Director Patrick Markey said the cathedral may use drone technology for future inspections to avoid scaffolding again.