There was one nineteenth century church in Covington that played an important role for German-American ecclesiastical art: St. Joseph parish was formed in 1853, and ground was broken in the summer of 1854 for a church building on the corner of Twelfth and Greenup Streets. After the arrival of two Benedictine missionaries from Latrobe, Pennsylvania, in 1858, who deemed the existing structure entirely too small, a new church was built at the same location and consecrated one year later.[13] In 1862 the new pastor at St. Joseph church, the Benedictine Rev.Odilio von der Gruen from St. Vincent in Pennsylvania, was distressed by the lack of altars in his church. His founding of the Covington Altar Building Stock Company set in motion the unique German-American enterprise discussed in Chapter 2. The Company built three altars for St. Joseph church in pure Gothic style with hand-carved wooden statues placed into niches of the structure. The statues were imported from Munich's Mayer & Co. St. Joseph church played an important role in the lives of a number of German-American artists: Johann Schmitt and Frank Duveneck worshiped there. Unfortunately the building was razed in 1970. However, it contained a mural by Johann Schmitt that had important historical significance. It portrayed St. Joseph as the powerful protector of the Universal Church and was inspired by the triumph of the German Catholic church dignitaries in their concerted efforts to resist the so-called Kulturkampf (battle for civilization). During the early 1870's, shortly after German unification, Chancellor Otto von Bismarck launched an effort to repress what he believed to be excessive interference by the Roman Catholic Church in the political and civic affairs of Prussia and other German states. His anti-Catholic campaign officially began in 1872 with the expulsion of the Jesuits from Germany and the suspension of diplomatic relations between Prussia and the Vatican. The laws also placed seminaries under state control and required that all instruction at these institutions be conducted in German. Many bishops were imprisoned, and thousands of parishes were without priests. But in the end the Catholic Church fought back by refusing to accept the measures imposed on it.[14]

   At Covington's St. Joseph church, the German-American painter Johann Schmitt created an elaborate imagery to illustrate the victory of the Church. He painted St. Joseph hovering above Rome's Basilica of St. Peter, built on a rock, with both arms stretched out in a gesture of blessing. (Figure 26, Johann Schmitt, St. Joseph, Patron of the Universal Church, mural at St. Joseph church, Covington, KY, 1875-1879).  Sister Hilary, O.S.B., eloquently described Schmitt's images in her essay "Johann Schmitt's Masterpiece", which was included in the Golden Jubilee publication of St. Joseph church: "On the left we see the enemy of Darkness, also called the Angel of Light, cross in hand, with great power crushing and dispersing the evil-doers. In front of St. Peter's, Pope Pius IX is standing on a pedestal. He is blessing a crowd of dignitaries, some of them kneeling in adoration. There are Cardinals, Archbishops, Bishops, Abbots, priests, nuns and children. They are receiving the blessing of the Pope and praying to St. Joseph, the Patron Saint of the Church. The Angel to the right of the Pope is bringing the Crown of Reward and the Olive Branch of Victory."[15]

   Schmitt's biographer provides additional information on the St. Joseph mural: It was originally executed as a drawing with silverpoint pencil and donated to Pope Leo XIII by the artist. The work is part of the Vatican's collection of fine art. [16] In the Schmitt biography the individual churchmen, depicted by the artist, are listed by name: To the left of Pope Pius IX are the Cardinals of England, of Poland, of New York, and the Abbot Boniface Wimmer of St. Vincent. In the group to the right of the Pope are German Catholic leaders together with several German laymen, who fought on the side of Catholics against Bismarck. Each one of these men is a portrait.[17]  It is astounding that the German-American painter Johann Schmitt was able to deliver such portraits with accuracy. He had after all been absent from Germany for over thirty years. Did he read German newspapers or did he derive his information from the German-language Catholic publications in the U.S., where photographs of the participants in the Kulturkampf were reproduced?  Whatever his sources might have been, the painter maintained close contact with the events in his homeland and with the leaders of the German Catholic hierarchy. The St. Joseph mural demonstrates an important fact: Rather than cutting off ties with their native country, the German-American church artists kept alive past traditions and got involved in contemporary happenings there long after they had settled in North America.

    St. Joseph parish and church in Covington played an additional role in the German Catholic community. In 1859 four Benedictine sisters arrived to take charge of the education of the community's children. Three years earlier twelve sisters had been sent to Erie, Pennsylvania, from Eichstätt in Bavaria, where St. Walburga is said to have founded the first convent for the German sisterhood of St. Benedict in the tenth century A.D.[18] The present day Benedictine sisters of St. Walburg Monastery on Amsterdam Road in Covington still treasure a painting of the Madonna and Child by Frank Duveneck, who dedicated it to his teachers in 1867. (see Figure 10). A large canvas by Johann Schmitt, signed and dated 1895, was discovered on the sister's property in 1981. Newly restored, it depicts St. Walburga blessing Covington's St. Joseph church, St. Joseph school, and the old St. Walburg Monastery and Academy (Figure 27) as they appeared in the late nineteenth century. The Covington Benedictine sisters also own three smaller canvases by Johann Schmitt: Christ as Shepherd of 1867, The Sacred Heart of Jesus (Figure 28,) and The Sacred Heart of Mary. In his prime the artist painted more than one hundred small pictures of the The Sacred Heart of Jesus. They were popular in the homes of devout parishioners in Covington and Cincinnati.[19]

   Aside from Northern Kentucky towns and villages, there was a great deal of activity by German-American church artists in Louisville, where a substantial number of German Catholics from Bavaria and other southern German states was already present in the 1830's. The city's first German Catholic church, St. Boniface, was built on East Liberty Street in 1836. The original church was dismantled in 1900. Only two oil paintings by Johann Schmitt, St. Francis and St. Anthony, remain in the new church today. In the 1850's a second German parish was established to accommodate the increasing surge of immigrants: Sankt Martinus (St. Martin of Tours) (Figure 29) was erected in 1853 at the southwest corner of Shelby and Gray streets. The new church building had been barely opened one year, when it faced a serious threat from anti-Catholic mobs organized by the "Know-Nothing " Party on Election Day, Monday, August 6, 1855. The rioters were determined to prevent immigrants, especially Catholics, from voting in the heavily Democratic German and Irish neighborhoods. On "Bloody Monday" twenty-two residents died at the hands of the nativist agitators, who believed that churches were being used for storage of arms and ammunitions to assist in an uprising by these same immigrants.(Figure 30). The church of St. Martin was saved by the intervention of Louisville Bishop Spalding, whose patron saint was St. Martin. [20]  By the late 1970's, St. Martin Church had survived a fire, a tornado, a flood, and a near sacking. The original nineteenth century German population has left the neighborhood, but a steady revitalization of the parish and a 1991 major restoration of the church have turned the decline in attendance around. The major attractions of the church interior are the exquisite stained glass windows, which were produced by the Royal Bavarian Art Institute and installed between 1893 and 1895. There are eleven of these large windows in pure gothic style. They illustrate events in the life of the Virgin Mary and in the lives of a select number of saints.