Loretto Chapel Stairway built in 1880

The Loretto Stairway in not a helix as a good many photographs show quite conclusively. Nor was it built in the years 1877 nor 1878. It is also well-established that the stairway was there in the Chapel in 1882 and 1881 as well. For in that latter-named year is when the famed Lt. John Bourke first visited the chapel on Easter Monday 1881 and marveled at it.

We also know for a fact that it was not there during the entirety of  1879. For it was in that year the Sisters of Loretto lost their architect Francis Mallet on the 1st of September, during the annual break between academic years for the "Our Lady of Light" academy. 

With Mallet's sudden demise rather quickly followed by the slow and malingering death of the designer/stonecutter's son Retail Mouly in mid-November. The 11/22/1879 death notice as it was published naming Antoine Mouly's son in precisely that way.  In other words Retail "projectus" Mouly died just about two week into the 1879-1880 school year. Doing so in the year just prior to the initial installation of the stairway and its initiating Novena.

And so, it is an absolutely undeniable fact that the original installation/build of the Loretto Chapel's stairway occurred during the first half of the year 1880