1785 - In New York City there were only two hundred Catholics and one priest. The predecessor church of St. Patrick’s Cathedral was dedicated to the Prince of the Apostles - Saint Peter - and was built and dedicated on Barclay Street in lower Manhattan. It is the oldest Roman Catholic parish in New York City Today.

1805 - Mrs. Elizabeth Bayley Seton, founder of the Sisters of Charity in this country, was converted to Catholicism and made her profession of faith, received first communion and was confirmed in the old Saint Peter’s Church.

1808 - The Diocese of New York was created and comprised the entire State of New York and the eastern part of New Jersey. It was one of four suffrage sees within the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

1809 - The recent elevation of New York as an episcopal see with its own bishop inspired the increasing Catholic population to build the original Cathedral of New York under the name of Ireland’s patron saint, Saint Patrick. The site chosen belonged to the corporation of Saint Peter’s Church and was located on Mulberry Street in lower Manhattan. The cornerstone was laid in June 1809.

1815 - A news article in the New York Gazette declared: “The new Catholic church in this city was last Thursday, Ascension Day, solemnly dedicated to God under the name of Saint Patrick. This grand and beautiful church, which may justly be considered one of the greatest ornaments of our city, and inferior in point of elegance to none in the United States, is built in the Gothic style and executed agreeable to the design of Mr. Joseph Mangin, the celebrated architect of New York. The superior elegance of the architecture, as well as the beauty of the interior, had for some months past excited a considerable degree of public curiosity. Upwards of four thousand persons consisting of the best families of New York attended the dedication,” which was begun in 1809 and lately so far completed as to be fit for divine service,

1842 - Bishop John Hughes became Bishop of New York. His cathedral was the largest church structure in New York City, where he safely guided the growth of the city’s Catholic population during a time of much religious bigotry and turmoil.

1850 - New York became an archdiocese and Bishop Hughes became the first archbishop.

1853 - Archbishop Hughes announced plans “to erect a Cathedral in the City of New York that may be worthy of our increasing numbers, intelligence and wealth as a religious community, and at all events, worthy, as a public architectural monument, of the present and prospective crowns of this metropolis of the American continent.”

1853 - Renowned architect James Renwick was engaged to design the current Cathedral at a cost of approximately $850,000, not including the altars, furnishings for chapels, organs and other furniture. The stone chosen was white marble.