Saint Nicholas, Egg Harbor 1864
-from Building God's Kingdom: A History of the Diocese of Camden, 1987
In 1864 Father Franz Junker, newly arrived from Bavaria, was sent as first resident priest to minister to the Catholics of Egg Harbor. Redemptorist Fathers from St. Peter's in Philadelphia had been coming to Egg Harbor to care for the Catholic community there since 1858. Bishop Bayley of Newark had laid the cornerstone of a church in 1860, but delayed by the Civil War, construction was not in progress until a few months after the arrival of Father Junker.
For a short period after Father Junker resigned and re- turned to Bavaria, the Redemptorists assumed care of the Egg Harbor mission. In August 1864 Father Martin Gessner, also in charge of spiritual care at Millville, Bridgeton and Cape May, was placed in charge of Egg Harbor. On August 22, 1866, Father Joseph Thurnes was appointed as resident pastor. Work on the interior of the church continued, and the school building was completed, opening in 1866. The church was dedicated on November 9, 1873.
The Sisters of St. Francis of Glen Riddle, Pa. arrived in 1895 to staff the school and continue at St. Nicholas until the present time. A convent was built in 1927 and a new school in 1928.
Father Joseph Esser (1878-85), while serving as pastor of St. Nicholas, attended the Catholic communities at Waterford and Hammonton. He began the construction of the first St. Joseph Church in Hammonton in 1884. Assumption, Pomona, mission, opened in 1925, was under the care of St. Nicholas until 1953. St. Mary's in Pleasant Mills was under the jurisdiction of St. Nicholas when it closed in 1885.
The original church was widened in the early 1940s. Father Francis J. Leonard is present pastor of St. Nicholas.
