In 1868 Father Edward Francis Daems, O.S.C., requested assistance in ministering with him among the immigrants on the peninsula of Wisconsin. Sisters Christine Rousseau, Pauline LaPlante, Mary Pius Doyle and Mary Immaculata Van Lanen responded. Together, they laid the foundation for the "Sisters of St. Francis of Bay Settlement", living a simple life, following the Rule of St. Francis, and educating immigrant children. The diversity of the immigrants' languages, the hard work of frontier life, poverty, and ill health presented great challenges for the founders, who received formal by the Bishop of Green Bay Francis Xavier Krautbauer on March 14, 1881. On its 75th jubilee as a Community in 1956, the community adopted the title, "Sisters of St. Francis of the Holy Cross".