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In the United States, it was in 1919, that Fr. Matthias Fohrman, a mild man more out of academic than missionary stock, set foot in New York on a fundraising mission to help the German province through the financial strains placed on them by war. Two years later, he learned that the Diocese of Lead, S.D., was looking for a religious order to assume responsibility for the Indian missions. Fr. Fohrman and the community accepted the request, starting work at St. Mary's Indian Mission in Lower Brule. A few more men came from the German province to join him. Some had been missionaries, recently expelled from African Cameroon when it shifted from German to French domination during the war. One of the primary needs they saw to in those early years, was a school for the young Native Americans. Going into great debt, Fr. Fohrman and his companions purchased several old buildings from a defunct college, opening St. Joseph's Indian School in September, 1927. Short on staff and housing, the school was plagued with problems. One building was condemned and a second was destroyed by fire. For over a year, sisters teaching at the school lived out of a chicken coop. Yet, it was the only school in the area, and its enrollment was never lacking. In the following years, more Germans continued to come to the U.S. missions. With characteristic order and determination, these SCJs saw the value of setting out immediately to recruit and organize American candidates to respond to the needs and problems of America's own disadvantaged people. A seminary system was scraped together out of abandoned properties and overworked personnel: an old infirmary in Ste. Marie, Illinois in 1925; an abandoned convent in Hales Corners, Wisconsin in 1929; a farm property in Donaldson, Indiana in 1935. Expanding through the depression years, each new work was an unusual story of faith and ingenuity of its own. Meanwhile, the work among the Sioux in South Dakota expanded to several parishes. During the second World War, instead of pulling in the reins and making do, the new U.S. Province was reaching out to new works. They moved into northern Mississippi where Catholics  were rare, and poverty was a neighbor, often black. After the war, there were more years of expansion. The systematic and patient work of building and recruiting began to supply more men for more fields of action. More manpower made it possible to upgrade the quality of training that could be offered. New schools for older candidates were opened. More and more men joined the growing American province, anxious to share their vision of Christ and be part of His work among the neglected of our society. American SCJs continued to respond as new ministries beckoned. They went to Brownsville and Raymondville, Texas, where many of Central America's displaced refugees have flocked, as well as Houston, where early immigrants made their home. They went to America's cities, accepting the needs of inner-city Hispanics and blacks. They continued to carry out the challenges of Fr. Dehon to rebuild our sometimes cheerless world into God's Kingdom of justice and love. Besides serving in parishes across the country, SCJs can now be found in court, fighting for justice for the poor. They are teachers, social workers, counselors and peace activists. They are in hospitals and prisons, ministering to the sick and forgotten. Some are chaplains to soldiers at home and abroad. Knowing no geographic boundaries, the U.S. Province expanded Dehon's mission across the globe. Since 1948, the province has sent men to South Africa, Zaire and Indonesia. In 1967, when De Aar, South Africa, first became a diocese, its bishop was an American SCJ. So is its second bishop. Want To Know More About Us? 
Vocation Office
P.O. Box 206
Hales Corners, WI 53130
1-800-609-5559 
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