Holy Rosary Catholic Church parish at Kranzburg was established in 1879 as the first Catholic parish within a radius of one hundred miles. The first mass was celebrated on June 24, 1879, by Father Alexander Berghold of New Ulm, Minnesota, who as a pioneer priest ministered to people across an extended area including Kranzburg, South Dakota. Father Chrysoston Foffa, O.S.B., was the first resident pastor of the Kranzburg parish. A centennial mass was celebrated on June 24, 1979, and the church was approved for listing in the National Register of Historical Places on June 6, 1986. In 1914, after Mrs. Nicholas Stricherz died on May 21 on Ascension Thursday, her family donated the St. Joseph altar to Holy Rosary Parish in her memory that same year.