Rensselaer Journal, Volume 11, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 September 1901 — FATHER STEPHAN DEAD. [ARTICLE]

FATHER STEPHAN DEAD.

One of the Most Noted Catholics of the Age Passes Away. Mgr. Joseph A. Stephan, superintendent of the Catholic orphan asylum during its existence here, and also pastor of the Catholic congregation here at that time, and later founder of the Indian school here, died in Washington last Thursday, at the age of 77 years. A Washington dispatch gives the following sketch of his life i Mgr. Stephan had been the director of the bureau of Catholic Indian missions since he resigned his chaplaincy in Sheridan’s army corps nearly forty years ago. He was more intimately connected with the Indian character and had seen longer service among the aborigines than any man in Washington. He was a staunch advocate of Indian rights and the possibility of creating among them civilized and self supporting communities. His plan was to educate the Indians at home.

He was aggressive in his methods, and a source of anxiety at times not only to the Catholic hierarchy but to the great political parties. In 1895 Congress determined to withdraw the appropriations for the support of sectarian Indian schools, and since that period Mgr. Stephan had labored to support his twenty odd thousand Indian pupils from the voluntary contributions of Catholics. His able coadjutor in this work was Mother Catherine Drexel, superior of the the Josephites and daughter of the Philadelphia millionaire. Two years ago his bureau would have been dissolved by the board of Catholic archbishops and the work delegated to the local dioceses upon the same lines of administration as orphanages, etc,, but his personality saved his project from destruction.

He was made a monsignore by the pope in 1896, and he bad been for years one of the most remarkable personages at the capital. He was patriarchial in appearance, with a long flowing gray beard and a massive, kindly face. His boast was that no outbreak or disturbance' had ever occurred among the Indians under his influence.