St. Augustine Cathedral (1868)

The first Catholic church in Fairfield County was Saint James the Apostle Church, a brick building built on the corner of Arch Street and Washington Avenue in Bridgeport in 1843. The church eventually became too crowded and the cornerstone of a new church was laid in 1866. Built of stone from the abandoned Pequonnock quarry in Black Rock, the new church, renamed Saint Augustine’s, was dedicated on on Saint Patrick’s Day, 1868. The church became the cathedral of the Diocese of Bridgeport, when that diocese was founded in 1953. The cathedral went through a major renovation in 2003-2004.