USA > Missouri > Encyclopedia of the history of Missouri, a compendium of history and biography for ready reference, Vol. I > Part 97
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ment of the pioneer population into sobriety and respect for law, promoting morality, rev- erence and education, founding colleges, maintaining schools and inculcating devotion to liberty and free institutions; and when- ever occasion called, its priests, teachers and Sisters of Charity have not spared their comfort, nor even their lives, in gathering orphans, assisting the poor, ministering to the afflicted and giving consolation to the dying in times of epidemie and distress. The first settlers in Missouri were Catholics, and the first worship of God was performed by Catholic priests. The first church in the State was the Catholic Church built at Ste. Genevieve, shortly after the settlement of the place in 1735, and the second was the Cath- olie Church built at St. Louis in 1770. In 1800 there were 442 organizations and 402 church edifices, with church property valued at $4,070,370, and 162,864 communicants.
Catholic Church in Kansas City .- The Catholic hunter was the first white man to reach the site of Kansas City. The Catholic priest was the first clergyman to come here. The pioneer spirit was as active in the soul of the French priest as in the French adventurer who first navigated the water and blazed the forests of the unknown West. The dauntless courage of the Cath- olic discoverer and voyager was kept alive by the knowledge that his priest would ac- company him and share his hardships or soon follow in his wake to administer to him the strengthening solaces of holy re- ligion. The training of the French priests at home was of a kind that made heroes of them. They courted the difficulties and privations of missionary life. They even emulated the apostolic lives, and ambitioned the martyr's death of the sainted mission- aries who fell victim to the knife and arrow and bludgeon of the savage tribes in New York and Florida and the country along the Atlantic shores. French priests said mass at St. Louis in tents before the first log huts were erected. With the authority and at the command of the bishop of Quebec, French priests did duty at Kaskaskia. Caho- kia. and among the Indians first visited by Marquette. When Robidoux first dipped his oar in the Mississippi and steered his canoe northward, and then went up the Missouri. in all probability he exacted a promise from
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the abbes then in St. Louis and the Floris- sant Valley to follow him. The American Fur Company, in whose employ he went forth, knew that the permanency and ulti- mate success of their agency in the Platte country depended to a great extent on the presence and ministrations of the priest, The company invited the priest to each of its agencies. Religion not only stimulated cour- age and fortitude in the brave employes, but made them more honest and zealous in the company's interest. As keen, observing men of the world, the officers of the American Fur Company reasoned that if religion was necessary in the environments of civiliza- tion, why not necessary, too, where there were no restraints of government, and when society's exactions had no force. If the gos- pel and the sacraments of the church elevated and kept in condition the moral tone of its members, while at the same time it advanced the business of the Fur Company, in its old agencies, it would work the same result in its newest and most western headquarters. While these and other equally logical rea- sons satisfy the belief that the Catholic priest established missions in western Missouri at the very beginning of this century, there are no data to confirm such belief. Yet there is nothing strange in the absence of confirm- ing proofs. The last quarter of the eight- eenth century witnessed the Catholic Church deprived of one of its strongest agencies for the preaching of its divine teachings in new countries. The Jesuits, as a society. were under the ban of the church's disap- proval-they were disbanded. The best drilled, the best disciplined, the most effi- cient corps in the army of the church was mustered out of service. The Society of Jesus was successfully working among the Indian tribes in the Eastern States, when Pope Clement XIV' issued the order to dis- band. This left the conversion of the West- ern tribes to a few diocesan priests engaged in Upper Louisiana and Ilinois. This was a new field for the diocesan priest. To en- ter upon it and to administer to the white men scattered along the Missouri River forced the pastors of Kaskaskia. St. Louis and Florissant to neglect for a time their flocks. The priests who entered tempora- rily upon this new charge worked as effec- tually as the Jesuits would have done. But their labors were spasmodic and without
plan. They were making church Instory, but did not record it. Whatever reports they made of their visits to the Indian and the frontiersman are not to be found to day in the archives of the diocese which commis sioned them. The parish records of bap tisms and marriages, started by the diocesan priests during their visits at the mouth of the Kaw, were lost in the high waters of 184-1.
The first priest known in have come to the Indians in middle and western Missouri and Indian Territory now the State of Kan- sasi was Father La Croix, a chaplain to the Sisters of the Sacred Heart at Florissant. He came west in 1821. He spent some time with the Frenchmen along the Missouri and Kansas Rivers, among them those located where Kansas City now stands, and then went to the fur agency at St. Joseph. He then returned to Florissant.
The next priest who did missionary work among the Western Indians and the West- ern white men was the Rev. Joseph Lutz. The time of his first visit was 1825. He was a young German priest, and at that time one of the clergymen assisting Bishop Ro- sati. at the St. Louis Cathedral. He knew there were Catholic Indians in the Terri- tory, and he opened a correspondence with them through the Indian agents. An In- dian chief. named Kansas, who was the head of the tribe of that name, went to St. Louis to have a personal interview with Father Lutz. The result was that Father Lutz started on his first missionary your among the Indians of the Territory. He visited the Kansans and the Kickapoo tribe. Even after the Jesuits became permanent mission- aries among those Indians, Father Lute's in- terest in them did not lag, and he frequently accompanied the Fathers on their trips west. Father Lutz spent several months with the French in the bottom lands, now the busi- ness districts of Kansas City. Here he regu- larly said mass, and performed all the duties of a pastor of souls. His visits ex- tended during the thirties and into the for- ties, as far as 1844. His residence during all this time was the Cathedral at St Louis. He was secretary to Bishop Rosati from 18.30 until 1844, when the bishop died. Ile retained his position under Bishop Kenrick until he was appointed pastor of St. Patrick's Church. St. Louis, a position he held
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only a short time. The writer heard Father Lutz's name spoken in the most affection- ate way by the Chouteaus, Turgeons and Ferriers.
Father Roux alternated with the Rev. J. Lutz in missionary work in Kansas City. Father Roux was a native of France. As pastor of Kaskaskia, he volunteered occa- sional service at the mouth of the Kaw. Father Roux first came here in 1833. The Catholics were no longer confined to the West Bottoms; they were in the East Bot- toms, too, and lived also on the surrounding hills. Father Roux said mass in a house near what is now Cherry and Second Streets. This point soon became the most central for his people. Father Roux was a practical busi- ness man. He had acquired property and built churches in Kaskaskia and Cahokia. It was he who gave a tone of permanency to the missions here. In his time, and for many years before and after, the site of Kansas City was known by two names-Kansas or Kanzas, and Westport Landing. The lat- ter title was given it because it was the shipping point or steamboat landing for the little town of Westport, a few miles south.
Father Roux purchased a site for a church. This was not only the first First Church Property. piece of Catholic Church property ever purchased in Kansas City, but it was one of the very first real estate trans- actions, for a consideration, ever made here. The land he purchased April 5, 1834, had only been patented by the government to Peter La Liberte on March 8, 1834, less than one month previous. The extent of the purchase was forty acres. This tract ran along the present west line of Broadway, from Ninth Street to Twelfth Street, and then due west to a point one hundred feet west of Jefferson Street. The consideration was the munificent sum of six dollars. Father Roux remained here after this purchase until December, and left in time for the holidays, for Kaskaskia was too important a parish to be without its pastor at Christmas. He returned after Easter of the following year, 1835, and remained until August. This was his last appearance here as missionary pastor. Many duties in his growing parish at Kaskaskia demanded his undivided attention. July 29, 1838, he laid the cornerstone of a new church in Kaskas-
kia. After Christmas of 1838 he left Kas. kaskia to see Westport Landing once more. His journey was only partly by river, on account of the heavy ice floats and because of the thick sheet of ice that covered the river from Jefferson City several miles west. The remainder of the way he made on horse- back and by wagon. He remained long enough to have ten acres parceled off the forty-acre purchase. These ten acres he deeded to Bishop Rosati. January 31, 1839. The ten acres are bounded by Eleventh Street on the north, Twelfth Street on the south. Broadway on the east, and the west line of the original forty acres on the west. The price value of the property to Father Benedict Roux in 1839 had advanced but lit- tle from what it cost him in 1835, just fifty cents. The consideration for the ten acres deeded to Bishop Rosati was two dollars. No real estate speculator in the days of the "boom," when Kansas City was phenomenal in its wonderful deals, judiciously made and quickly turned over, for a moment figured on such premium on an investment as that made by the church in its purchase from Father Roux. The two acres used for a graveyard up to 1880 supplied the means by which Father Donnelly purchased St. Mary Ceme- tery. and the ten acres which he deeded to the Sisters of St. Joseph in 1879. The sale of the half block on Washington Street. from Eleventh to Twelfth Streets, erected the orphan asylum on the ten acres given the Sisters. The block bounded by Twelfth and Eleventh Streets, and by Pennsylvania and Washington Streets, was deeded by Arch- bishop Kenrick in 1866 to the Sisters of St. Joseph, at the request of Father Donnelly, and much of the expense of the main build- ings erected by these Sisters for academy purposes was defrayed by the sale of brick and lime made by the same Reverend Father on this tract. Father Donnelly sold stone from a quarry which he called Rocky Point, on Twelfth Street, between Pennsylvania and Jefferson Streets, for riprapping the banks of the Missouri River, and for other pur- poses. The proceeds of all sales he gave to the Sisters in the time of their need and for helping to purchase and aid St. Joseph's Hos- pital. But the Sisters were not the only beneficiaries of Father Donnelly's business management of the ten acres. The Church of SS. Peter and Paul was liberally aided
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from this revenue, and although the figures are not now at hand, and possibly there is now no record extant of the amount he gave it, it is not overstating the amount to say he contributed to this second church started in Kansas City the amount of $2.500. To St. Patrick's Parish Church, for the first three years of its existence, he contributed $3,000 from the sale of brick from the brickvard which stood on the site of the episcopal resi- dence. This donation he frequently made known from the pulpit and in private conver- sation, as well as through the columns of the Kansas City "Journal" and of the "Times." To Annunciation Parish he gave $300, all he could spare, for when this parish was erected, his parochial territory was restricted, and there was no lime or brick kiln to furnish him the means to be more generous.
The Westport Parish was always a concern of Father Donnelly's heart. He gave in property and material to that parish $2.500. The Redemptorist Fathers received a worthy gift from him. He was proud of the honor of inviting them here. The sale of the bal- ance of the ten acres made the building of the cathedral and Christian Brothers' school a matter of not much effort. The importance of Father Roux's work here will justify the further notice that he spent the year 1840 in Europe, and that from 1841 to 1846 he was attached to the St. Louis Cathedral.
April 11, 1823, the Rev. Charles Van Quick- enborne and the Rev. Jesuit Missionaries and Pastors. Peter J. Timmerman, two Jesuit Fathers, with seven aspirants to the priest- hood and three lay brothers, left White Marsh, Maryland, for Missouri. They reached St. Louis : I o'clock p. m., Saturday, May 31, 1823. It was that same day. May 31. 1673, just one hundred and fifty years before, that Father Marquette passed the site of St. Louis. In 1827 Father Van Quickenborne went on his first missionary excursion to the. Osage Indians in the Territory. He stopped for a few days with the fur traders at the mouth of the Kaw. He said mass, preached and administered the sacraments to them. The special purpose of the Jesuits in coming to Missouri was to spend their lives in civil- izing and Christianizing the Indian tribes dwelling in the Territory. Father Van Quickenborne's first visit to the Indians con-
vinced him that "no great or permanent results could ever be accomplished among the indolent, wandering and indocile abor- igines of the woods and prairies, which would at all compensate for sacrificing all their energies and resources in exclusive attention to the savages." (Father Hill's "History of St. Louis University.") Ile returned to St. Louis to work among the white population, and to re-establish the St. Louis College, which for some years up to 1826 had been conducted by diocesan priests. He paid two other visits to the Kaw settlement and to the Osage Indians, one in 1829, and the other in 1830. We next hear of the Jesuits in the Indian Territory in 1836. Fathers Van Quickenborne and P. Van Hoecken, with three lay brothers, established a mission at Kickapoo Village in the spring of 1836. In 1837 the Rev. Christian Van Hoecken, S. J., brother of Father Peter Van Hoecken, S. J .. and the Rev. Anthony Eisvogels, S. J., visited the Catholics at Independence, Liberty, Westport Landing. Fort Leavenworth, and other places north along the Missouri. In 1837. at the command of the Rev. Van Quickenborne, the superior of the society in the West, the Jesuits built a log church on the forty-acre tract belonging to the Rev. Bene- dict Roux. Father Roux was in his parish at Kaskaskia, and gladly granted the necessary permission.
This church was called for a Jesuit saint, St. Francis Regis. It was
St. Francis Regis built on what is now the Church. south line of Eleventh Street, and would be in the middle of Pennsylvania Street. West of the church they erected, in 1840. a two-room log house. This log house stood on the southwest corner of Elev- enth and Pennsylvania Streets, and remained standing until the property was purchased by the late Thomas Bullene. Pictures of the hut are plentiful to-day, and are sold as the likeness of the first Catholic Church ever erected in Kansas City. The church was torn down in 1858, and as far back as 1872 there was not a vestige of it left. The excavation of Pennsylvania Street forced the removal of the very foundations. During 1840-1 Westport Landing was at- tended from Kickapoo Village.
In 1842 the Rev. Anthony Eisvogels was. removed from Kickapoo Village to Westport
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Landing. He was the first resident pastor of what is now Kansas City. His missions were Independence, Weston, Irish Grove and Fort Leavenworth. In this year the Jesuits left Kickapoo Village for Pottawottomie Vil- lage, now known as St. Mary's. Father Verhoegen succeeded Father Eisvogels, and was pastor during 1844-5-6. Father Saunier, diocesan priest, took charge of Westport Landing in 1847. During Father Saunier's sojourn in the east, in 1848, Father Donnelly, then stationed at Independence, replaced him. Father Saunier was pastor up to 1849. From 1845, when Father Donnelly came to Independence, he efficiently aided Father Saunier in his ministrations among the Eng- lishi-speaking Catholics. This friendly aid rendered by Father Donnelly perhaps gave rise to the belief that he was pastor here from 18.45.
With Father Bernard Donnelly begins the modern history of the church in Kansas City. It is humbly prayed that his spirit will look down forgivingly for thus placing him. His ambition in life was to be classed among the ancients. He spoke of the early missionaries with an air of intimate acquaintance, and closely connected their deeds with his own. Father Donnelly succeeded the Rev. A. Saunier in the charge of the mission at Kansas late in 1849. or very early in 1850. The name Westport Landing had given way to that of Kanzas. In the spelling now, the letter "z" is dropped and "s" is substituted. This innovation in the spelling was never recognized by Father Donnelly. To the end, he clung to the letter z. Small towns were not as ambitious then as now, and the affix "City" had not been made to Kanzas as late as 1850. Father Donnelly's parish continued to be Independence. He resided there, and from there attended Kanzas. Besides Inde- pendence and Kanzas, he also attended Sibley in Jackson County and Lexington in Lafay- ette County. He visited Catholics south and west almost to the Arkansas line, and east within twenty miles of Jefferson City. He never lived in the old two-room log hut at Eleventh and Pennsylvania Streets. While doing duty in this locality he made the hut his resting place, and frequently stayed in it over Saturday and Sunday evening. It was the Jesuit Fathers and Father Saunier who made it their residence. In 1857 Father Donnelly built a brick church facing Broad-
way, about midway between Eleventh and Twelfth Streets. He also erected a one-room brick house with a basement. This house was enlarged at various times until it became a four-room house and two stories high. After completing this work, he wrote Arch- bishop Kenrick, suggesting that a pastor be appointed to live in Kansas City. Rev. D. Kennedy was commissioned to take the posi- tion. He came here, and learned that there was a debt of $3,000 on church and resi- dence. He waited on Father Donnelly in his home at Independence, and stated that he was going to return to St. Louis, and that he saw no prospect of paying a debt of that size in such a small town. Father Donnelly failed to persuade him to return to Kansas City. He then proposed to Father Kennedy that he himself would immediately write the archbishop. asking him to permit Father Kennedy to become pastor at Independence, where there was no debt, and to appoint him- self to Kanzas City. The archbishop con- sented, and Father Donnelly became resident pastor here in 1857. The new church he called the Immaculate Immaculate Conception Conception. The name of Church. St. Francis Regis ceased to be the parish title with the demolition of the old log church. For over twenty-two years, as pastor of Immaculate Conception, Father Donnelly labored in season and out of season for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. His first assistant was Father Michael Walsh. who remained with him but a few months, when he was appointed pastor of Westport. This was in 1870. Father James Doherty replaced Father Walsh. He was promoted to Annunciation Church, St. Louis, January 1. 1872. Father James Phelan was assistant until December of 1872, and his place was taken by Father Curran, who came in 1878. Father Donnelly resigned in March, 1880. Father David J. Doherty assumed the pas- torship of Immaculate Conception on Whit- sunday, 1880. Father Doherty was young, zealous and highly educated. His cheerful, happy disposition, and his frank, open char- acter, made him deservedly popular. During his short pastoral charge he erected the resi- dence now occupied by the right reverend bishop. Immaculate Conception Church be- came the Cathedral of Kansas City diocese on the appointment of Bishop Hogan. The
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cornerstone of the new Cathedral was laid Sunday, May 11, 1882, by Bishop Hogan. The occasion brought out a large gathering. and delegations came from St. Joseph. Sedalia and Independence. AArchbishop Fee- han, of Chicago, preached an eloquent ser- mon, in English, and the Right Rev. Abbott, of the Immaculate Conception, preached in German. The cathedral was opened for divine service on Trinity Sunday. 1883.
The first division of Immaculate Concep- tion Parish took place in SS. Peter and Paul's. 1866. German Catholics were among the principal supporters of Father Donnelly from his com- ing to Kansas City to reside. They rapidly grew in numbers until Archbishop Kenrick felt justified in giving them a pastor of their own nationality. Father Reusse, now of SS. Peter and Paul's Parish, St. Louis, used to aid Father Donnelly in hearing German con- fessions, and in giving missions to the Germans of Kansas City. He came here frequently for years for that purpose from his parish in Henry County. Father Schrei- ber. of Weston, also came off and on at Father Donnelly's invitation for the same purpose. Father Grosse was appointed pas- tor of the Germans. He soon organized them into working order. Property was secured on the southwest corner of McGee and Ninth Streets, and the basement of a good-sized brick church was started. In this basement mass was said for some months. Father Grosse was succeeded by Father Andreas, who labored assiduously until 1872. Father Zechenter. the present pastor, took charge in August of the same year. erected a schoolhouse and pastoral residence.
Father Halpin was the first pastor of St. Patrick's Parish. lle said St. Patrick's Parish. mass for the first three months in SS. Peter and Paul's Church. The property secured for a church site was on the southwest corner of Seventh and Oak Streets. Father Halpin be- gan work on a large church, but only suc- ceeded in covering in a part of the basement. The stone work of the basement was more cx- pensive than was at first contemplated by pas- tor or figured by the architect. The cause of this was that it was necessary to excavate very deep for a foundation to build on. It was said that the excavation on one side was fully thirty-five feet. Father Halpin re-
tired on July 11. 1872. Father Archer, of St. Louis, was the next pastor. He came here in August following. Father Archer was a success from the very beginning. Hle quieted discordant elements and gained the good will and co-operation of his people im- mediately. At this remote day it is not too late to correct a false impression in regard to the financial condition of St. Patrick's Par- ish on the arrival of Father Archer. After a thorough investigation by a committee appointed for the purpose, Father Archer found but a trifling debt. So well pleased were pastor and people at the discovery that steps were taken to erect a church on the basement walls. But expert mechanics soon discovered a weakness in the walls that would not permit of a superstructure. This placed the congregation in a quandary, and it was long and often debated whether the walls should be torn down or the property sold and a new location selected. Father Archer held a successful festival during the Christ- mas holidays of 1872, and netted about $1.200. This, with some subscriptions, made the church's treasury nearly $2,000. In Feb- ruary, 1873. Father Archer was called to St. Louis to take charge of St. Patrick's Church. Father James A. Dunn was St. Patrick's third pastor. He purchased the present location. The first property was sold and much of the stone in the old basement was used in the masonry work of the new building. This was done without interfering with the use of the church on Seventh and Oak, because only a little more than one- fourth of the walls of the foundation were covered with a roof. It was stated in a lecture given by Bishop Ryan in the Coates Opera House, for the benefit of St. Patrick's Church, that the manner of construction of that church reminded him of the way churches were built in the middle ages-the people were all giving a helping hand. As there were many contractors and mechanics living in the parish, and very little work was going on at the time, all the idle men and the unhired teams were gratuitously helping to draw material and place it in the walls. The result was that the stone masonry cost the parish but a very small sum in money. Labor was cheap and so was material, and Father Dunn was fortunate in getting the bricks in the walls for less than five dollars per thous- and. The new church was opened on Christ-
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