Catholic missionary, born in Saintes, France. Ordained a Sulpician priest (1791), he emigrated to the USA during the French Revolution and did missionary work in Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan, and from 1798 was based in Detroit. He founded several Catholic schools, and in 1817 co-founded the University of Michigan in Detroit (which moved to Ann Arbor in 1837). He acquired a printing press (1808), with which he published a newspaper and various books, and he also imported textile machinery to promote industry. Imprisoned by the British in the War of 1812, he later became the first Catholic priest to serve as a delegate (before Michigan was a state) to the US House of Representatives (1822). He died while ministering to victims of a cholera epidemic in Detroit.
Father Gabriel Richard (1767–1832) was a Roman Catholic priest, who was born in France and a Congressional Representative from Michigan Territory.
Work in Detroit
He came to Detroit to be the assistant pastor at St. Anne's Church. In 1804 he opened up a school in Detroit, but this was destroyed by the fire in 1805 which destroyed the city. Gabriel Richard wrote the city of Detroit's motto: Speramus meliora; He had the first printing press in Detroit and published The Michigan Essay, or Impartial Observer, in 1809.
Political career
Father Richard was elected as a nonvoting territorial delegate to the House of Representatives in 1823 and was the first Catholic priest to be elected to that body, serving a single term in 1823-1825. In 1832, Richard died of cholera in Detroit.
Legacy
There are at least two schools near Detroit named after Fr. Gabriel Richard Regional Catholic High School in Ann Arbor. The motto that he first penned is still used by Detroit today. Detroit: Wayne University Press, 1950. Famous Americans page The Detroit Almanac: 300 Years of Life in the Motor City. Detroit: Detroit Free Press, 2000.
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