St. Mary's Assumption History
St. Mary’s Assumption Catholic Church is located on beautiful Bayou Rouge in Cottonport, Louisiana. The present church was built in 1958 and consists mainly of stone and concrete. Keeping in mind the friendliness of the people in the area and their propensity to get together and talk, the architect designed a raised terrace surrounding the front of the church where the parishioners can congregate and visit after Mass.
For a small town, Cottonport is a very active and wonderful community to become a part of. All one needs to do is come and let us know what you would like. Usually, we can accommodate you, or we certainly try.
In the latter part of the 19th Century, with only a few families in the area, Cottonport did not have a Catholic church. The priest from Plaucheville, Louisiana, traveled weekly to say Mass in a local store. In 1887, permission was granted to the Cottonport people to build a church and construction began. In 1898, several nuns from the order of the Daughters of the Cross arrived to teach in the parish’s first parochial school, St. Anthony’s Academy, located on Front Street in Cottonport. They remained until 1917. The church survived the floods of 1927, and in the early 1930’s enlargement and remodeling of the church began. In 1947, a new parochial elementary school was built, and Dominican nuns moved into the old rectory. new rectory was built for the priests. In 1956, the dream of the people to have a larger, modern church became a reality. By 1958, the present church was dedicated.
In 1958 and the original church building in use was converted to a gym-auditorium. The same church building, built in 1889, was placed on the National Register of Historic Places by the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1989.