Famous baseball player for the Baltimore Orioles, Boston Red Sox, and New York Yankees who was raised in southwest Baltimore and attended old St. Mary's Industrial School on Wilkens Avenue – George Herman ("Babe Ruth") Ruth (1895–1948) was married here in October 1914 to Miss Margaret Helen Woodford.

The church was dedicated on December 13, 1838, as the only Roman Catholic parish between Baltimore and Frederick, Maryland, 30 miles to the west.

By 1851, the District was officially separated from Anne Arundel and erected into the 22nd jurisdiction of the state of Maryland as the newly named Howard County with its seat of government and courthouse set up in newly renamed Ellicott City., on the banks of the Patapsco on the eastern border of the new county adjacent to older Baltimore County, It was named after Colonel John Eager Howard (1752–1827), a Baltimorean and Marylander militia officer in the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War, Father Coskery also established the ministry of the Christian Brothers' religious order to come and staff and support the nearby Rock Hill College (a boys boarding school / secondary school) in 1857, which had been founded three decades earlier in 1824.

Augustin Verot (1804-1876), originally from France in 1830, after serving 23 years on the faculty of St. Mary's College and theological seminary (founded 1791 in Downtown Baltimore on North Paca Street, He was sent to Ellicott City shortly after the erection of the river town's designation as the county seat of the recently separated Howard County two years earlier in 1851.

He had just finished playing a short 1914 season with his home town team, the Baltimore Orioles (then playing 1903–1953 "in exile" in the International League "Triple AAA" minor league level) after being discovered and signed to a contract by longtime legendary owner / manager Jack Dunn (1872–1928), while he was completing at the St. Mary's Industrial School on Wilkens and Caton Avenues in the southwest City.

Ruth had just been dubbed with his soon-to-be-famous nickname as "Dunnie's Babe" and was traded further north (initially as a pitcher) with the Boston Red Sox of the American League.

His most famous sports seasons would occur in the subsequent decades with the "Bronx Bombers" of the New York Yankees[9] Ruth, who was known to fabricate certain elements of his personal history, later claimed that he "married [his] first wife in Elkton."

[10] For the curious or rabid baseball fans, a copy of the Ruths' 1914 Ellicott City, Howard County marriage certificate is exhibited by St. Paul's in the church narthex.

application documents for the historic Roman Catholic church to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places, maintained by the National Park Service of the United States Department of the Interior, (which appears never to have been officially submitted or acted upon), it was noted in the descriptive details that "In addition to its historical merit it is an outstanding example of American eclectic architecture, blending elements of the Gothic and Romanesque style architecture in its fenestration and entrances with simple granite stone architecture so indigenous to Howard County geology.

"[2] St. Paul's Church created a chapel for the young men students of the nearby Rock Hill College also run by the Christian Brothers religious order two years after they arrived in 1859 by parish priest Father Augusta Venot's invitation.

In the modern 21st century, St. Paul's served as a refuge for people during the devastating Ellicott City flood on the upper Patapsco River that took place on July 30, 2016.