Vincent Village

Serving homeless families since December 1989

Founding: Vincent Village grew from Vincent House, a shelter opened in the former St. Hyacinth convent on the parish campus — the diocesan paper's 2025 account dates the organizing to 1988, when Bishop John M. D'Arcy allowed the use of a building adjacent to the church, while the agency's own listings carry service "since December 1989"; both dates are given, organizing and opening. It began small, sheltering up to seven families.

What it is: Vincent Village became the only Fort Wayne facility providing transitional housing and shelter for two-parent families with children as well as single-headed households — the gap in a shelter system mostly built for single adults and mothers alone. By 2010 it served about 60 families a year; its listings count over 700 homeless families served across its history. The Vincent House shelter, ten bedrooms at 2827 Holton Avenue, anchors a scattered-site transitional-housing program. It is the modern, parish-born counterpart to the St. Vincent Villa orphanage a century earlier — the name is not a coincidence of the record, and the diocese's charitable line from 1886 to 1989 runs through both.

Sources:

1. Vincent Village / Volunteer Center listings — serving homeless families since December 1989; the only two-parent-family transitional facility in Fort Wayne; Vincent House, 2827 Holton Avenue; over 700 families served.
2. Today's Catholic (2010) — the St. Hyacinth convent beginning, seven families at first, about 60 families a year by 2010.
3. Today's Catholic, 5 August 2025 — founded 1988 after Bishop D'Arcy allowed the use of the St. Hyacinth building, the divergent date noted in the entry.