Browse Items (3180 total)

“Parishioners of Mason City’s second Catholic parish gathered with their founding pastor, Father Edward J. Dougherty, in the public library for their first Mass on an October Sunday in 1908. Construction of the church began the following spring…

"In the early 1880s Father Patrick H. Ryan lived in the Tom Magirl home while forming a parish and building a church. The church foundations are still visible in Calvary Cemetery on highway 13, about two miles south of Ryan. Completed about 1882, the…

"Catholics of northeastern Jackson County received permission from Bishop Clement Smyth to build their first church on land given by Christina Burns and her son Zachariah. The community came to be known as Burns Settlement, but the name of the…

"Located about 15 miles northwest of Dubuque, the parish was established at French Settlement, about two miles from the present site. There French families of the Trois-Rivieres district of Quebec had put down their roots. […] Bishop Mathias Loras…

"Father John Nemmers, their Gilbertville pastor, celebrated the first Mass in the new church in the summer of 1906. It was probably on July 4, as the first recorded baptism took place after Mass on that date. The church was probably named and…

"Father F. Kenny was pastor of Sabula and caring for the Preston Catholics, when Bishop John J. Hennessy appointed him resident pastor of Preston and in charge of the Sabula parish as well. He was the first to celebrate Mass in the area, first in the…

"The 1850s brought to Iowa some priests willing to ride from one settlement to another to provide pastoral care for the Catholic pioneers. Among them was a Czech Redemptorist missionary, Father Francis Kroutil, who spent himself visiting the…

"In 1874 Bishop John Hennessy granted the Vernon and Center Township Catholics permission to build a church and appointed Peter Erschens and Nicholas Mayer to organize the people. During the construction Father Bernard W. Coyle of Saint Anthony’s…

"Before the early settlers built their first church, Father James Harding from Cresco began to visit Ossian in 1858 and celebrated Mass in the railroad depot or the John Collins home. Before that it was not uncommon for the Catholic pioneers to walk…

"Saint Catherine Parish, about eight miles south of Dubuque, bean in 1851 with the building of a log church on land donated by two settlers, Anthoy Noel and Hubert Rider. Before that, Mass was celebrated occasionally in the home of John Noel, three…