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F I R S TP R E V329NEXTLAST

Old St. Mary's, Chinatown
Old St. Mary's was the first building erected as a cathedral on the West Coast. It was established in 1853 by Father Henry Ignatius Stark to teach the Chinese about the Catholic faith. The original church was built by Chinese laborers in 1854 from stone quarried in China and sailed around Cape Horn. In 1903, the church established a mission, teaching the local Chinese prostitutes to sew as an alternative profession. The Church was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire but rebuilt in 1909. In 1921, St. Mary's founded a school of which, Gordon Lau, the city's first elected Chinese-American supervisor, would graduate. Carved below the clock dial is the admonition: "Son Observe the Time and Fly from Evil."
[ MAP F-15 ]


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