St Michael’s Parish

The history of the Church in the district dates back to 1896 with the arrival at Roelands of a few Catholic families, which saw the eventual building in 1901 of a small timber and iron church at Roelands. A priest travelled from Bunbury only once every four months.

When some of the Catholic families moved to Brunswick, it was decided to move the Church from Roelands to Brunswick. Mr Frank Devlin collected money to buy the land. The first mass was offered towards the end of September 1909. In 1914, fundraising began for a new church – Our Lady’s Assumption Church – the one still standing today, which was finally blessed and officially opened in 1922 by His Grace Archbishop Clune.

In the mid 1930’s a number of Italian migrants arrived in the area and over the next decade there was quite a large populatoin of Italian people in the parish and 1956 saw the intorduction of ‘Fiesta’ to celebrate Our Lady’s Assumption. It is still celebrated today.

Polish migrants also contributed to our ethnic mix after the war and 1951 saw the Presentation Sisters arrive. The opened St Michael’s Catholic School in Brunswick in 1952, in an empty building that was to be a cheese factory, to help provide a Christian education for the local children. St Michael’s has done much to enhance our parish community. In 1955 Brunswick was made a Parish, with Father Luigi as Parish Priest.