Saint Raphael's Cathedral (Madison, Wisconsin)

In the early 1840’s, Irish immigrants settled in and near the Madison isthmus and founded St. Raphael Parish.  The first recorded act of this new parish was the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass by Father Martin Kundig in the territorial capital of Wisconsin on August 15, 1842.  Governor J.D. Doty, a friend of Fr. Samuel Mazzuchelli, OP, donated land for a church on West Main Street between Fairchild and Henry.  Frs. Adalbert Inama and Max Gaertner and other visiting priests offered Mass in homes and in the new State Capitol.  Father Robert D. Whitehead was appointed the first pastor, remaining six months in 1848, the year Wisconsin became a state of the union.