In 1899 Ducey built the "House of Repose for the Stranger Dead", a separate mortuary chapel at 9 East 28th Street for people of any faith who had died while temporarily being in the city, such as hotel guests.

[5][6] The bodies could remain there until being claimed for a proper funereal arrangement, or St. Leo's clergy would handle the service without remuneration.

[7] The Gothic Revival church was built in 1880 to the designs of Lawrence J. O'Connor,[1] of rough-cut brownstone.

The New York Times reported on August 16, 1880, that "the tower on the east side of the church will be 105 feet high, and over the main entrance will be a colossal cross".

Berghold with 30 policeman kept the 2,000-person street crowd under control, as every seat within the enclosure of the un-roofed church was already occupied.

[2] "The corner-stone bore a legend in Latin which translates as: 'His Eminence Cardinal McCloskey, Archbishop of New-York, laid the corner-stone of the new church of St. Leo, on the 15th day of August, 1880, the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Leo XIII being the reigning Pontiff of the Church.

United States coins of all denominations, a picture of Pope Leo XIII, a large photograph of Cardinal McCloskey, attired in his large cape, copies of Catholic papers, and of New-York daily papers were placed in the corner-stone.

Brady sent the boy to the College of St. Francis Xavier in Chelsea and employed him in his law office.

[10] Although Brady considered Ducey better suited to the practice of law, he entered St. Joseph's seminary in Troy, New York in 1864; he was ordained in December 1868.

Ducey is described as a "flamboyant character with a flair for self-advertisement who combined a taste for high society with progressive views on social reform.

During a series of sermons in 1871 and 1872, he denounced the Boss Tweed ring, who retaliated by trying to have him removed to a parish outside the city.

In May 1873 Ducey was assigned as assistant to John Lancaster Spalding at the Church of St. Michael on Ninth Avenue.