Father John Althoff, a young Dutch priest of the Canadian Diocese of Vancouver Island, established the first permanent Catholic presence in the U. S. territory of Alaska when he founded Saint Rose of Lima Church in Wrangell on 3 May 1879. Having been assigned responsibility for missions in Alaska, Bishop Charles J. Seghers of the Diocese of Vancouver Island sent him to serve Wrangell, the Cassiar mining district on the Stikine River, and the former Russian capital of Sitka, where he would celebrate Mass in an old Russian carriage barn. Fr. Althoff subsequently moved to Juneau following the discovery of gold in the vicinity and celebrated the first mass and baptism in an interdenominational "Log Cabin Church" on 17 July 1882.