A Brief History of Cathedral Of the Nativity,
of the Blessed Virgin Mary 

The first Catholic Mass on Alaskan soil was celebrated by two priests doing survey work with a Spanish fleet.

On Ascension Day, May 13, 1779, at Bucareli Bay (near Craig, Prince of Wales Island), Fr. Juan Riobo records: "I sang a Mass of Thanksgiving for the safe voyage...a little Indian girl was baptized."

In 1872, Rome placed the Alaskan territory under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Victoria, BC, the closest diocese. Bishop John Seghers of Victoria made his first visit to Alaska in 1873. He established St. Rose of Lima, the first Catholic parish in Alaska, in Wrangell on May 3, 1879, just 100 years after the Spanish priests had been here. Fr. John Althoff, a diocesan priest of the Victoria diocese, was appointed pastor, with missions in Sitka and Juneau.

There has been a continuous Catholic presence on this same block of Fifth Street since 1885, when Fr. John Althoff was assigned to pastor the growitn mining community in the silverbow Basin. Fr. Althoff's little church, built in 1886, was replaced in 1910 with teh present structure. It became a Cathedral in 1951 when the southern and southeastern parts of the CVicariate of ALaska were split off to become the Diocese of Juneau.