St Mary's Cathedral is one of Tasmania's architectural gems, yet it was marred with a difficult birth. This is the story of how it was built, paid for, used, taken down and then rebuilt. This history reveals something of Tasmania's Catholic community, and gives a sense of the social and cultural milieu of nineteenth-century Hobart and beyond. Clergy, laity, architects, labourers, benefactors, men, women and children all had their parts to play in building St Mary's Cathedral.