Roman Catholics were few in number at the birth of our nation.  They only numbered about six-tenths of one percent – 25,000 out of 4,000,000 of the population.  Most were located in Maryland and Pennsylvania, and it was a son of Maryland that was the lone Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence – Charles Carroll.  Soon after the Revolutionary War ended, two great migrations swept the new nation.

The treaty that ended America’s War for Independence clarified American claims to vast territories and bounty lands outside the original thirteen colonies.  Large numbers from the eastern seaboard began to cross the mountains into Tennessee, Kentucky and the Northwest Territory (i.e., the territory north and west of the Ohio River).  The next factor was an increased immigration from Europe into the United States, which started as a trickle, but soon became a flood.

Ohio, the first state of the "Old Northwest," received a number of persons from the east coast and others from Europe.  Catholics were still few in number and scattered.  Although Mass had been celebrated as early as 1749 by missionaries to Native American Indians in the northern part of the present state of Ohio and later in the century in the colony at Gallipolis, the first permanent Catholic community in Ohio was centered around Somerset.  In 1808, Father (later Bishop) Edward Dominic Fenwick of the Order of Preachers -- Dominican Friars -- visited that area and returned periodically to the small group of Catholics. A log Church, the first Catholic Church in Ohio, was dedicated by Father Fenwick and Father Nicholas Dominic Young, O.P., his nephew and co-worker, on December 6, 1818.  The church building was constructed on land donated to the Dominican friars by the Dittoe and Fink families. The church was named in honor of Saint Joseph, the patron of the Universal Church and special patron of the Dominican Order in America.

In the spring of 1819, Father Young passed through Zanesville, then a small village. There he met three Catholic families and celebrated Mass -- the first Mass in Zanesville -- at the Green Tree Tavern, an Inn owned by John S. Dugan, which stood at the corner of the present Fifth and Main Streets. Later that same year Mass was celebrated in the Burnham Hotel in Putnam, then a village distinct from Zanesville. Nineteen people constituted the Catholic community in Zanesville in those early days but soon the number increased. In November 1820, John Dugan purchased a lot with a small brick warehouse (20 x 50 feet) for the sum of $2000 located at the corner of Fifth Street and Locust Alley, and converted it into a church. That Church, dedicated a few months later, was called Trinity Church or "the brick chapel," the first Catholic Church in this area. Father Young, O.P. came twice each month (from Somerset) to Trinity Church in Zanesville but great feasts such as Easter presented a special problem. Father Young could not leave his larger congregation in Somerset. Consequently Catholics from the Zanesville area would have to make the difficult trip (nearly twenty five miles each way) on horseback or by carriage on poor roads. The situation was eased in 1823 when the first resident pastor, Father Stephen Hyacinth Montgomery, a Dominican Friar, was named for Trinity Church in Zanesville.

The population in the area continued to grow and Catholics were attracted by the presence of a church. The converted brick warehouse proved too small for the growing congregation but funds for a larger church were scarce. John Dugan again showed his generosity when he purchased a lot at the corner of Fifth Street and Spruce Alley, the site of the present church. A further donation by Mr. Dugan as well as the generosity of many other local people -- both Catholics and Protestants -- allowed Father Montgomery to begin construction of a new church of stone and brick. The cornerstone of the new structure, almost three times the size of the original warehouse-church, was laid on March 4, 1825. It was dedicated by Bishop Edward Dominic Fenwick, O.P. (the first Bishop of Cincinnati) and named in honor of Saint John. The church building did not completely fill the lot, so a small Catholic cemetery was established at the rear of the plot.

In 1825, Mr. Dugan and Father Nicholas D. Young, O.P. went in Mr. Dugan's stagecoach to Maryland to meet Bishop Fenwick (who had been in Rome) to bring him back to Ohio. In Washington, they were joined by Father Gabriel Richard from Detroit, then a member of Congress. On their return trip a tragic accident occurred near Cumberland, Maryland. While they were descending a mountain the horses became unmanageable and the stagecoach overturned. Bishop Fenwick and the two priests received only minor injuries but Mr. Dugan suffered serious injuries and died a few hours later in the arms of Bishop Fenwick on March 11.  His body was brought back to Zanesville and he was the first buried in the new Catholic cemetery on the land he had purchased for the new church. His body now rests under the present Church of Saint Thomas Aquinas.