August Bruyer, his wife Josephine (Simon), and their sons John and Julius were born in France and came to America about the middle of the nineteenth century, settling by 1858 in Fairview Township, four miles east of what became Vermillion. As Catholics, they established a center for worship and burial there when August donated ten acres in 1859 for a church site and cemetery. In 1860, a small log church with a dirt floor was built on the site in Section 15, Township 92 North, Range 51 West, becoming the first Catholic church building in South Dakota. Afterward, the church depended on transient priests until 1879, usually from St. Peter's Church in Jefferson, which had been established in 1862, and there was no other Catholic church in Clay County. In 1879, a resident pastor was appointed, and under Father Hennesy's supervision a new frame church was built south of the present cemetery on the south side of the road, while the first log church had stood at the southeast corner of the present cemetery. This newer church served the Vermillion community until a new church was built in Vermillion in 1885 under Father Collins. In 1905, the Fairview parish was discontinued and its members were attached to the Vermillion parish. Gravestones in the Fairview cemetery bear the names of Bruyer, Lynch, Carey, and other early settlers.