Mahon, Leo, “Monsignor Leo T. Mahon interview and trancript,” Digital Collections, accessed April 8, 2025, https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/document/24582.
In the early 1950s, Monsignor Leo T. Mahon, an Irish American priest who was then head of the Hispanic apostolate in the Chicago Diocese, organized the (Knights of San Juan), as a religiously inspired community action group among Puerto Rican men. The group was tremendously successful and soon became a model that other dioceses strove to replicate around the country, including in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. Monsignor Mahon developed the program based on the idea that religious development takes place best where social stability and self-confidence prevail.