Monsignor John J. Doyle

May 17th marks the 86th anniversary of the ordination of Monsignor John J. Doyle, for whom this website is dedicated. He died on March 22, 1985. We gladly reissue an earlier entry about the Mons. Msgr. Doyle was born in Indianapolis on March 13, 1898. He attended St. Joseph’s Parish school, which was then located on the corner of North Street and College Avenue. He attended St. Meinrad seminary in southern Indiana and he was ordained on May 17, 1921 Msgr. Doyle, known to many as the “Mons” spent most of his career as a professor at Marian College in Indianapolis. After his retirement, Monsignor Doyle became the Archivist and Historian of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis. He contributed much to the understanding of Indiana Catholic Church History. In 1976 he published “The Catholic Church in Indiana 1686-1814“. In 1978 he published “Genealogical Use of Catholic Records in North America” for the Indiana Historical Society. Msgr. Doyle’s love of history, especially his love of history of the Church in Indiana always showed through. This photo of him as a young priest and another from his 80th birthday were taken from the PALNI web site. [http://replica.palni.edu/]. In his history of the diocese, mentioned above, Msgr. Doyle pays tribute to Father Robert Gorman who actually wrote a history of the diocese, but it was never published. Father Gorman died in 1964. We hope to eventually publish parts of his history here. For now, however, you can view the first chapter of Fr. Gorman’s history by clicking here .