James J. Dougherty was appointed the first pastor, and in 1880 he began conducting Mass over a feed store at 404 East 78th Street.

[5] John J. Boyle served as acting rector at St. Monica's before becoming the founding pastor of St. Luke's Church (Bronx, New York) in 1897.

[6] In 2015, the Archdiocese of New York ordered St. Monica's merged with St. Elizabeth's and St. Stephen's to better serve 21st century Yorkville.

[1] In 1926, the rector Arthur J. Kenny had a three- and four-story brick school and convent with tile roof built at 410 East 80th Street, to designs of Thomas Dunn for $120,000 ($2,070,000 in current dollar terms).

A three-story convent at 405–413 East 79th Street was built in 1955 to designs by Brown-Guenther-Booss for $275,000 ($3,130,000 in current dollar terms).