John Joseph Hogan

He was a missionary to slaves in Potosi and Old Mines, Washington County, Missouri in 1852 and 1853. He was priest at Saint John Apostle and Evangelist church and founded Saint Michael's parish, both in the City of St. Louis, Missouri. In 1857, he started a series of missions in outstate Missouri, ministering mainly to transient Irish railroad workers and Catholic settlers. He ministered primarily in Chillicothe, Macon City, Brookfield, Mexico, and Cameron, Missouri. In 1859 he started a settlement of Irish in southern Missouri, which was wiped out during the American Civil War; this deserted area is now called the Irish Wilderness. The northern Missouri missions suffered greatly during the war, not due to military battles, but by attacks of bushwackers and guerillas. The public school system collapsed during the war, and Father Hogan set up a school for two years. After the war, Father Hogan was arrested for failing to take the Ironclad oath, a requirement of the Radical Missouri constitution of 1865; this provision was later declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States.

Hogan was appointed as the head of the newly erected Diocese of Saint Joseph on March 3, 1868, and was consecrated Bishop by Archbishop Peter Richard Kenrick of Saint Louis on September 13, 1868. He was appointed Bishop of the newly erected Diocese of Kansas City on September 10, 1880, while remaining Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Saint Joseph. He resigned from administration of Saint Joseph on June 19, 1893. He died February 21, 1913 and is buried in the center of Priest’s Circle at Mount St. Mary’s Cemetery.[3]