Pierre-Jean De Smet, SJ was the first priest to visit the area in 1838.

[2] The first Mass in the settlement was said by another Jesuit missionary the same year in Robidoux's log house.

Thomas Scanlan arrived in St. Joseph of October 15, 1845, and began plans to build a church.

He had a 40 by 20 feet (12.2 m × 6.1 m) brick church built on the northeast corner of Fifth and Felix Streets.

Bishop John J. Hogan bought property at the corner of Tenth and Isadore Streets to build the present cathedral.

Several prominent parishioners connected with the St. Joseph Improvement Company sponsored a raffle of real estate in the cathedral neighborhood to raise funds.

Ticket sales were slower than expected and the drawing was delayed from November 22, 1870, to April 10, 1871.

When the first Mass was celebrated on March 17, 1871, the interior had yet to be plastered and the stained glass windows were not installed and construction continued to 1883.

[4] The old church was eventually demolished and the property was sold with the proceeds helping fund construction of the new cathedral.

In the 1850s Religious of the Sacred Heart and the Christian Brothers came to St. Joseph and opened schools.

The Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul came to St. Joseph in 1869 and began to operate a school and a hospital.

The Religious of the Sacred Heart opened St. Joseph's first parochial school in 1901.

The cathedral is a brick masonry building designed in the Romanesque Revival style by Patrick F.

It features a transept, two corner towers on the main façade with pyramidal roofs.

It features a hipped roof and an entrance portico with Doric columns and capitals.