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Quickfacts:
- Population: 419 (or 506?)
- Telephone exchange: 483-xxxx
- Zip code: 63627
- Township: Jackson
- Name Origin: Father Blume
- Previously known as: La Fourche a Duclos
Quicklinks:
History
1880 - The area was
called Colonel Valle's farm and was owned by Jean Baptiste Valle Sr.
1824 - Jean Baptiste sold about half
of the land to Michael Placet. When Placet died, it was
divided among his five daughters, three of whom lived there.
(Marie Olmphe married to John Drury, Aspasie married to Jean
Baptiste Charleville, and Marie Louis married to ___ Bonneau.)
1835 - there were about 50 families
1859 - JB's daughter Pelagie and her
husband (they'd married after his death) donated land for the
church and burial ground
Historical
Locations, Bloomsdale, MO
John Drury House, 1830's
"1 mile W of Bloomsdale on County Rd E
1 mile N on Unmarked Rd
4 room, 2 story house with central hall. 1 of 4 fireplaces
open; mantel intact; one ceiling to floor cupboard in hallway of
upper story; windows replaced in original style. One-story
portico. Ornamental iron fencing."
John Lee Home, about 1835
"6 miles NW Bloomsdale on Hwy 61
2 story 8 room house; L-shaped weather-boarded log. Spiral
staircase with carved stair brackets and newel post. One
carved mantel; original width-board floors in 2 rooms. Two
chimneys; porch replaced. Lee was surveyor & steamboat owner."1
St. Agnes Parish
In 1673, when Father
Marquette and Joliet floated down the mighty Mississippi River, not
far from view was the flowery dale, that, in 1874, was poetically
named Bloomsdale. It was built around the place of worship,
now known as St. Agnes.
The first settlers, in about 1790,
probably traveled to a neighboring parish to worship. The
earliest traveling missionary efforts recorded were under the Ste.
Genevieve-based Vincentian priest, Father Francis Xavier Dahmen, who
arrived in Ste. Genevieve on September 29, 1822. He could
speak and write French and German -- skills which were in demand
because of the swarms of immigrants from Germany arriving and
intermingling with the French-dominated population.
Mass at this parish was probably first said at
home gatherings. Later, the small congregation was known as
St. Matthew's on the Establishment Creek. When a chapel was
built at this station about 1835, the congregation was called La
Fourche a Duclos on the Establishment. However, in 1839, the
name was changed to St. Philomena on the Establishment.
Father Dahmen served until 1840, followed by
Father Gandolfo, who served this mission station from Ste.
Genevieve. In 1846, the first secular priest, Rev. John
Anselm, was stationed at Little Canada (French Village) and assigned
St. Philomena on the Establishment as an outmission.
St. Philomena church records began in 1850. The
cornerstone for the first church in honor of St. Philomena was
placed on June 30, 1851 by the pastor, Rev. August Saunier, who was
stationed at French Village. The present church cornerstone
was laid in 1865, when a larger rock church was built around the
small log structure.
The first resident priest at St. Philomena Parish in
Bloomsdale was Father Louis Rosi, who asked the local residents to
build him a log cabin. His heroic death, which occurred while
he was on his way to care for a sick person near Zell, was the
result of the swollen Establishment Creek, where he was drowned.
He was immortalized by Father St. Cry of Ste. Genevieve parish in
the Book of Burials. his comments (in part) were: "On first of
September, 1853, I, the parish priest of Ste. Genevieve, buried on
the epistle side of the sanctuary in the church of St. Philomena,
the remains of Rev. Louis Rosi, who drowned August 30 near Bantz's
mill on the way to a German settlement to assist a sick man... May
he rest in peace, for he laid down his life for his sheep."
Priests serving the parish as a mission were many, before a
resident priest was assigned. Yet a priest remained for a
time, then the parish was back as a mission, or the Bloomsdale
priest served Lawrenceton and French Village as missions of
Bloomsdale.
- 1822 - F. X. Dahmen (Vincentian) stationed at Ste.
Genevieve
- 1840 - Gandolfo (Lazarist) stationed at Ste. Genevieve
- 1848 - John Anselm (first secular priest) stationed at
Little Canada (French Village)
- 1850 - August Saunier at Little Canada
- 1853 - Louis Rosi (not sure how assigned) at Bloomsdale
- 1858 - John Anselm at Bloomsdale or French Village
- Civil War - uncertain years
- 1867 - Theodore Kussmann at Bloomsdale or French Village
- 1869 - Engelbert Blume at Bloomsdale or French Village
- 1871 - John Daly at Bloomsdale or French Village
- 1872 - P. Mollenbeck at Lawrenceton
- 1875 - H. Mehring at Lawrenceton
- 1878 - G. A. Watson at French Village
- 1879 - M.C. Walsh at Bloomsdale from this date forward
[???]
- 1881 - P. A. McNamee
- 1882 - John H. May
- 1882 - (late) Augustine Huettler
- 1884 - Peter A. Trumm
- 1891 - Louis Schathoelter
- 1893 - S. Kurtenbach
- 1895 - Michael Helmbacher
- 1897 - Michael Bush (church interdict)
- 1898 - John H. Krechter
- 1902 - Joseph Preuss
- 1909 - Henry Hassel (died and buried December 1955 at
Bloomsdale)
- 1956 - F. Wieberg
- 1964 - Edward Deutschmann
- 1971 - John Majewski
- 1985 - Vincent Huels
Many priests from
surrounding parishes are noted on our records as performing baptisms
and marriages at this parish, but not as an assigned pastor.
The parish parochial school was
started in 1879 under the direction of then pastor, Rev. M. C.
Walsh. The first teacher was a secular, and the enrollment was
twenty. From 1898 to 1901, the school was taught by the Sister
Adorers of the Most Precious Blood of Ruma, ILL. Miss Kate
Weber, a lay teacher, followed until 1903. Since then, the
Sisters of the Most Precious Blood of O'Fallon, MO, have conducted
the school, grades 1-8.
Enrollment peaked in the mid-1970's,
at 240 students. Present [date?] enrollment is 146
students, which includes 21 from the neighboring parish at St.
Lawrence. An active P. S. R program serves 32
children, grades 1-8. The faculty includes three Precious
Blood Sisters and six lay teachers.
The first school rooms were in a
four-room house. A frame two-story school was completed in
1905. After storm damage, the frame building was replaced by a
stone structure dedicated in September 1937. The newest school
building was dedicated in November 1975, resulting in a middle
school building and a primary school building.
In 1960, the name St. Philomena was
withdrawn from the list of saints. The parish name was changed
to St. Agnes at Bloomsdale. Currently, the parish lists a
total of 400 families under the direction of pastor Rev. Vincent
Huels.
---notes about this
source---
Also on the church, in 2002, a shameful thing was done and the
cemetery was desecrated. Read about it on the
cemetery's page.
Sources:
1. Missouri Historic Sites Catalogue; edited by Dorothy J.
Caldwell; published by the State Historical Society of Missouri;
Columbia, MO; 1963
2. Ste. Genevieve
Family Histories
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