Index

St. Mary's A-K

St. Mary's L-Z

A bit of History:

St. Mary's Catholic Cemetery was platted 13 Jul 1901 in a part of the northeast quarter of sec. 11, twp. 81 and contains 10 acres. It is situated on the 2nd Ave. Road, some distance west of the city and contains many graves and some notable monuments. History of St. Mary's Church The third oldest and largest of Clinton's Catholic churches is St. Mary's. It was, however, the first to be built in the City of Clinton. The first pastor in St. Mary's parish was the Rev. P. V. McLaughlin. In 1865 or 1866, Jean, the pastor at St. Irenaeus, erected a small frame church on the corner of 6th Ave. & 4th St., the present site of the Roosevelt Administration Center. This church, during the pastorage of McLaughlin, was enlarged to a seating capacity of about 1,000 people. The location, however, not being satisfactory, the beautiful and commanding site on 9th Ave. & 5th St. where St. Mary's now stands, was aquired by McLaughlin. He died in January of 1879 and was buried under the alter of the church he had reconstructed. He was succeeded immediately by the Rev. E. J. McLaughlin, who in 1884 began construction of the present St. Mary's, which is 78 feet wide and 167 feet deep. It was described as "one of the finest churches of any denomination in the state of Iowa." In connection with the church, a parochial school was established in the 1870s and was enlarged in 1880, but was partially destroyed by fire in 1906. That same year, construction began for a new school and was occupied for the first time in January of 1908. The parochial school of St. Mary's was considered one of the finest buildings in the state, and was erected at a cost of about $36,000.