Sisters of St. Joseph
In 1902 nine Sisters of St. Joseph from the mother-house at Le Puy took charge of the school in the French parish of St-Roch, Fall River, Massachusetts. The accession of other members from the mother-house enabled the community to take charge of three other schools in the city attached to French parishes. In 1906 St. Theresa's Convent was formally opened as the provincial house of the community, which was legally incorporated in the same year, and a novitiate was established. In the mid 1970s, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Fall River merged with the Springfield Congregation.
St. Joseph's Church (Staten Island)
St. Joseph's was established in 1848 as a mission of St. Peter's Church by that church's pastor, the Rev. Mark Murphy. Fr. Murphy celebrated the first Mass on July 2, 1848 for 58 Catholics in a house on Rossville Avenue. In 1851 a small chapel dedicated to St. Joseph was completed on Poplar Avenue. The mission was upgraded to parish status in 1855 and thereby the chapel upgraded to church status with Rev. Francis DeCaro, O.F.M., being appointed as first pastor. With its 1855 establishment, St. Joseph's is the third oldest of Staten Island's 36 parishes after St. Peter's and St. Mary's.