The Morning Star and Catholic Messenger (New Orleans [La.])
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
583 issues from 1868 to 1879, published in New Orleans, Louisiana, digitised for Chronicling America.
Founded in 1868 as the official journal of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, the Morning Star and Catholic Messenger was the first Catholic English newspaper in the Old Southwest. Its circulation in the 1870s was approximately 4,000, of which 1,500 copies were distributed throughout Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas. The paper was published by the New Orleans Catholic Publication Company, a joint stock company presided over by the archbishop of New Orleans. Its motto, printed under a large illustration of the Virgin Mary, was “How Beautiful Are the Feet of Them That Bring Glad Tidings of Good Things.”
The paper’s founder, Archbishop Jean-Marie Odin (1800-1870), was inspired by Father Napoléon-Joseph Perché, who in 1842 had established Le Propagateur Catholique, a French-language periodical that combated nativism and the anti-Catholic Know-Nothing Party, and who would later succeed Odin as archbishop of New Orleans. Odin had planned to establish an English-language newspaper around the time of his election as archbishop in 1861, but was unable to do so until after the Civil War. The Morning Star and Catholic Messenger’s primary audience was Irish Catholic. Miscellaneous news from the United States, Europe, and Ireland was combined with reports on Catholic charities, schools, and missions. Also of interest are announcements of Catholic publications, directories of churches and schools, a weekly calendar of events, pastoral letters of Gulf Coast bishops, and regular…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- New Orleans, Louisiana, United States
- Language
- English
- Collection
- Chronicling America
- Licence or status
- None stated by the archive
- Rights
- The Library of Congress believes that the newspapers in Chronicling America are in the public domain or have no known copyright restrictions. Newspapers published in the United States more than 95 years ago are in the public domain in their entirety.
- Credit
- Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities
- Who can read it
- Teens profiles and older (placed by Invisible Network from what the archive says; archives give no ratings)
- Archive
- Library of Congress