Browse Items (254 total)

"The advent of the Chicago Northwestern Railroad with its shops attracted some to Belle Plaine, and the fertile farm land brought others to the area. As more Catholics arrived, Sunday Mass outgrew private homes and the public school was used until…

“When many Waterloo Catholics located in the northern part of the city in the early 1900s, they found it difficult to reach the church and school downtown. As Archbishop James J. Keane became aware of their difficulty, he directed the Franciscan…

"Saint Francis Church is located in Barclay Township, Blackhawk County, near Waterloo. It began in 1862 with the decision to build a church on the Joseph Rittelmeier farm two and a half miles southeast of Dunkerton. Limestone for the building was…

"The present church was built in 1898 under the direction of Father William Banfield, who served as pastor from 1893 to 1953. Legend has it he served all those years without an official appointment. Father Banfield saw the small town spring up across…

"Families of Irish railroad workers in the 1850s were the nucleus of Saint Patrick Parish in Anamosa, the county seat of Jones County. The present brick church near the center of the town, completed in 1929, was the third church for the parish. The…

"The second parish in Waterloo Catholic history is Saint Mary’s, which began with the appointment of a pastor in 1898. “The German Catholic Saint Mary’s Building Association” was formed in 1894 to work toward a German parish. The German Catholics…

"In 1899 the pastor of the Gilbert parish, Father Henry C. Eckhart, celebrated the first Mass in the Ames community. The Gilbert church and rectory were in the country, some miles from the town of Gilbert. Father Eckhart was followed by Father…

"In 1899 Father Henry C. Eckhart came from the Gilbert parish north of Ames to celebrate the first Masses in Ames. The Catholic pioneers used the William Kingkade home and a grove on the John Meyers farm, and later Read’s Hall in downtown Ames.…

"Natives of Ireland were the first Catholic settlers in the West Ridge area of Winneshiek County, about eight miles northwest of Waukon. Norwegian settlers were their neighbors to the south. In 1860 Bishop Clement Smyth bought a lot for a cemetery…

"Until 1897 the early Catholic settlers of Alta Vista in Chickasaw County attended either the Elma or the North Washington parish church. Rural roads that sometimes became impassible caused them to ask Archbishop John Hennessy for permission to build…