From 1836 through 1890, the Bishop of Galveston cared for all Catholics in Texas. In 1890, the Diocese of Dallas was established and included The Texas Panhandle area. Missionaries were sent from Gainesville in Cook County and Henrietta in Wise County.
The roundhouse (a building with a circular or semicircular shape used by railways for servicing and storing locomotives) was built in the town of ”New” Clarendon in 1891. Many German and Irish Catholic families moved in and the Bishop of Dallas decided to build a church in New Clarendon, and make it the headquarters for further missionary efforts to the other sparsely populated areas of the “Last Frontier”.
The Rev. J. J. O’Riordan was put in charge of building a new church by Bishop Brennan. It was completed in June of 1892 at the corner of McClelland Street and Montgomery Street.
The next Bishop, E. J. Dunne, bought land for a cemetery and a school in late 1898. The school was built by Fr. John Lenert, next to the church grounds. It was completed in time for school, January 1899. The school, run by the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word from San Antonio, was a day co-ed and a girl boarding school. It was very popular until its closing in 1911 due to a typhoid epidemic. The nuns moved to Amarillo and opened St. Mary’s Academy there in 1913. The school in Clarendon was torn down and sold for lumber in 1918.
The cemetery is located on Highway 70 across from the Clarendon City Cemetery.
The roundhouse was moved from Clarendon to Childress when it was certain that Amarillo would be the main Panhandle crossroads. The Catholic population in Clarendon dwindled and has never quite recovered.
Amarillo was made a separate Diocese in 1927. Since then, St. Mary’s has been a mission of churches in Memphis, Groom and Childress. Pastors from these towns came to Clarendon only on Sundays to say mass.
In 1949 Bishop Fitzsimon named Fr. Richard Vaughan to restore the church, whose brush covered facade hid the fact that the bell tower was gone and the vestibule had been removed and its gothic windows replaced with rectangular ones. Father Vaughan set about raising the money and restoring the little church as far as was possible. The work was completed in 1951. Bishop Fitzsimon then dedicated the church as “The Shrine of Our Lady of the Panhandle”.
In 1975 Bishop Matthiesen named Fr. Arnold Carlson as Pastor of St. Mary’s in addition to his duties as Pastor of Groom. In 1981 Father Carlson moved to St. Mary’s and remained until he retired in 1994. Father Carlson was succeeded as parochial administrator by pastors: Father Terry Burke, Father Theodore Podson, Father Jose Gomez, Father Neal Dee and Fr. Jose Palathara. Each of these priests commuted from Amarillo, Memphis or Groom. Currently Father Raj travels from Groom each week for Sunday Mass.
Father P. F. Sullivan - 1887-88
Father Henry Brinkley - 1888-89
Father T. J. Coyne - 1890
Father J. J. O'Riordan - 1891-92
Father Thomas Blakeney - 1892-96
Father James Malone - 1896
Father Daniel O'Sullivan - 1896-97
Father John Lenert - 1897-99
Father Andrew Kearns - 1900
Father David Dunn - 1900-16
Assistants to Father Dunn
Father P. H. Hartman - 1904
Father Charles Lindeman - 1907-13
Father Erasmus Gloeckner - 1909-10
Father William Bender - 1912
Father P. J. O'Grady - 1913-16
Father M. G. French - 1916-18
Father J. P. Cuny - 1919-20
Father C. D. Boutich - 1921
Father Charles Dvorak - 1922-27
Father M. G. French - 1928
Father Raphael Kramer - 1929-30
Father Henry Hofer - 1930
Father J. A. Williams - 1931
Father James Daly - 1932
Father J. A. Lahive - 1933
Father Rupert Schindler - 1934-35
Father Arnold Boeding - 1936-41
Father J. A. Lahive - 1937-46
Father Norbert Wagner - 1943-45
Father Andrew Quante - 1946-49
Father Richard Vaughan - 1949-51
Father James Comiskey - 1951
Father Lorcan Connaughton - 1951-54
Father Clifton Corcoran - 1954-58
Father Bartholomew Besterci - 1959-61
Father Daniel O'Sullivan - 1961-63
Father John Magana - 1963-67
Father Leroy Matthiesen - 1967
Father Kenneth Yaroch - 1968
Father Ladislaw Wolko - 1968-75
Father Arnold Carlson - 1975-94
Father Terry Burke - 1994-95
Father Theodore Podson - 1995