The church of St. John the Evangelist, the first church of the Redemptorists in this hemisphere, stood 215 feet east of this marker. It was begun by Rev. S. Mazzuchelli, O. P. and completed by Redemptorist missionaries sent from Europe by Rev. Joseph Passerat, C. SS. R. They arrived here on August 31, 1832, the first resident priests in Wisconsin in over a hundred years. Called St. Francis Xavier by the Redemptorists, it was the only Catholic church in Wisconsin. The Redemptorists left in 1837. The church burned down on Christmas, 1847. The present church of St. John the Evangelist in Green Bay is the successor of this church and the oldest continuous Catholic parish in Wisconsin.
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