The first Roman Catholic Mass in the area was served in the late 17 th century on Middle Bass Island for the Huron Indians, the region’s first known Catholics. They lived around Lake Erie and its islands, having been converted to Catholicism by Jesuit missionaries from Detroit and Canada.   Mass was offered again in 1749 to the Hurons at their settlement near Sandusky Bay. The Indian missions were abandoned when the Jesuits moved on. The French-Canadian missionaries, however