9 10 108 https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/e7d423746b612934b6aa582f39932577.PNG 9895188b913e1d60f14980bd7099b7ff https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/d348782f0051d1a23f181dbdeee554c7.mp3 a5d25f8c889aa6d2509bfbd7cdc120c0 https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/f143babda00908c8121b6097b57d12bb.pdf 87d7bce1fd042e19e1202c7079825691 PDF Text Text Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 1 of 19 JK: This interview is with Sister Mary Denise Sternizke. The interviewer is Jane Kenamore, and we are at the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth Mother House in Leavenworth, Kansas. The date is June 28th, 2017. Sister Mary Denise, I love that name, by the way. It's beautiful. Sister Mary Denise, when and where were you born? [00:00:26] MDS: I was born in 1922 in Sedalia, Missouri. JK: Oh, ok. Can you tell us about your parents and how they influenced you over the years? [00:39:00] MDS: My dad, Leo Sternizke, worked in the offices of the MKT or Katy Railroad, and I think my mother must have been doing secretarial work or something, but that's where they met. And my dad was an ardent Catholic. Mother is a convert, but she was a good convert. I mean she really converted. And after one year, because when the Katy offices moved we moved too. So, we moved to Boonville, Missouri, were there for about eight years. And then they moved the offices to Parsons, Kansas, so we moved to Parsons, Kansas, and that's where I lived for the eight years before I entered the Sisters of Charity. JK: And did you enter the Sisters of Charity right out of high school? [00:01:36] MDS: Yes, I did. JK: You did. MDS: Yes. JK: And what attracted you to religious life? [00:01:42] MDS: I think my vocation to religious life started three days after I was born. My father took me to be baptized. He wasn't taking any chances. He's going to have his daughter baptized right away, and in those days you didn't have a big ceremony. I mean it was just the sponsors. And when the sponsors had left my dad picked me up, took me over the Blessed Mother's alter and offered me to her. JK: Really. MDS: That was a pretty big thing. I never knew that until the day I said, "Dad, I want to be a Sister." And then he told me that. JK: Oh, my goodness. That is very interesting. [00:02:27] �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 2 of 19 MDS: And I know that he was the happiest person on earth at that point. My mother didn't take it quite so (laughs)… quite so calmly, but, you know, it evolved and got better and better, our relationship and finally she was actually happy that I did that. JK: Oh, good. Good. How long did it take your mom to accept your entering the SCL community? [00:02:59] MDS: Well, she came up with me to visit, to see the place and see if that's what I really wanted, and she was very good about it. And, you know, as the community evolved ,that is, in changing habits and all that, she liked that and there was a lot more freedom and getting to go visit them. So, by the time we had gotten pretty close to the end of our lives, why, she was very happy that I had done it. JK: Oh, good. That's good. Like many other new members of the community you spent your early years teaching in grade school and elementary school. MDS: Yes. JK: So, first you taught in the lower grades, is that right? [00:03:53] MDS: Yes, I did. I started out in the third. Then I had first and second, and then went onto to the sixth to eighth (phonetic) group. JK: And how many years were involved in that? [00:04:06] MDS: It was about six years, you know. JK: Oh, ok. Ok. And, let's see, you went to Denver? [00:04:16] MDS: Those are all correct. My elementary… there was Denver, and St. Mary's is right but not Topeka and Billings. JK: Oh, ok. MDS: Those were high school. JK: Oh, those were high school. Ok. How were your experiences…? Since you had never taught before how did you deal with this? [00:04:36] MDS: Teaching was not my choice. I wanted medical technology. JK: Oh, you did. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 3 of 19 MDS: I did very much. But in the community you do what the community needs, you know. And I had never been around children of that age. I mean I had no particular rapport with them. All I had was one brother and he was just three years younger, and we didn't babysit in those days. And I can say I did not like teaching in the elementary. I mean I just didn't feel comfortable with people that age. It was a whole different story when I got with teenagers. JK: Oh, was it? [00:05:22] MDS: Oh, yes. Loved them; loved them. JK: Oh, good. So, then you did go on and teach in high school, and where did you teach there? [00:05:33] MDS: I taught in all of our high schools except about three. My longest stretch was in Topeka, but I also taught in all three of the Kansas Cities—Missouri, Kansas, and North Kansas City— and Falls City, Nebraska, Billings, Montana, Denver. JK: Where was your favorite place to teach? [00:06:01] MDS: I think St. Pius X in North Kansas City. JK: Oh, really? MDS: I think so. JK: And what did you like about that? [00:06:07] MDS: The students were students for one thing. I mean it was very academically oriented. And there was no such thing as any problem with discipline. Their parents were behind them and they were good students. In my sophomore class the top 20, if you can believe it, academically were boys except for one girl. JK: Really. MDS: That's unusual. I mean girls at those ages usually outshine the boys. JK: Right. What were you teaching at that time? [00:06:48] MDS: Different levels of mathematics—one, two, three and four—and chemistry. JK: Upper math… MDS: Yes. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 4 of 19 JK: …was more boy oriented at that time. MDS: That's what they say, but, you know, in one school where I had too large a class for a fourth year math we had four rows of boys and one whole row of girls. JK: Did you? MDS: Yes. When they're good they're very good. JK: That's good. So, you were saying earlier that teaching math has changed drastically over the years. Can you tell a little bit about that? [00:07:32] MDS: Can I just lump the math and chemistry together because the same things have happened. In the span of time that I was teaching those courses the subject matter and the method of teaching changed radically, probably more in chemistry than in math. But people don't realize that mathematics research is going on at a great rate at the same time. It starts at the universities and then trickles down. And the people teaching are going to have to change with it and that means continual education. And I was very lucky in math. The community sent me to Notre Dame as soon as I got my bachelor's degree and I spent the summers there, taught in the winters. And I got my master's in mathematics in the summer of 1955, I think it was, and then continued teaching in the high schools. And as far as chemistry is concerned it changed even more radically and it required even more preparation on the part of teachers. And the thing was that the college chemistry teachers were saying that high school students are not prepared for college chemistry. So, that meant the high school chemistry had to be revised and really revised from being descriptive chemistry to theoretical chemistry, and that's harder for both the teacher and the student. JK: And can you define descriptive chemistry and theoretical? [00:09:25] MDS: Kind of. If I said to you today we will study sulfur. Sulfur is yellow. Things like that that describe the element, not so much what they do. And then the theoretical part was based almost, not entirely, but more on energy and energy changes and it was more difficult. And so the teachers really had to go back to school, and we would be getting things in the summertime. Well, my master's degree from Notre Dame gave me a big head start on the mathematics, although I did take some other courses later. But the National Science Foundation came to the rescue and offered a large number of summer fellowships in the sciences. And what you had to do is to apply for one and if you got it then you had a free ride for that summer to study. I had �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 5 of 19 one in physics at Seattle U. I had one in chemistry at St. Louis University. I had one in math at Brown University and another one at Notre Dame one time. JK: Oh, my gosh. MDS: So, by that time I had a much better science background although I still took some work later on. And teachers just had to do that if they were going to present the material that was in text books. JK: Right. And when was this big change? I mean I'm sure it was over several years but when was the…? [00:11:11] MDS: Yes it did. It evolved. It evolved. JK: What was that time period? [00:11:15] MDS: I got my master's degree in '55, 1955. The years following that, and it wasn't just one year, I mean. It was a continual thing. And every summer or before the summer the National Science Foundation would print a booklet of what was being offered, and then you could pick out what you needed and apply for that, and if you got it, that was it. You went. JK: That's great. That was kind of post-Sputnik, so there was a lot of emphasis on science and math during that period. [00:11:54] MDS: Yes, yes, because it was changing so much, I think. JK: So, overall, did you teach in a girl's school too? [00:12:06] MDS: No. JK: So you always… MDS: One year when I taught, when we still had an academy here, and that was all girls, I taught one chemistry class there. JK: Oh, just one. [00:12:17] MDS: Yes. Because I was studying at the same time. JK: Oh, ok. So, that wasn't a very sizable experience but how did the girls in the all girls environment do as opposed to the girls in the co-ed environment? [00:12:38] MDS: Well, I think people think they're supposed to… �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 6 of 19 JK: Right. MDS: …because the boys seem to take dominance in those subjects. But one of my challenges, and one that I was really dedicated to, was to get more girls into the field, to really like and want to go on in mathematics. And it was a real reward for me to get someone who was scared to death to take a math course to get over that. I even met that at the college. They had one math course required and there were people who left it to their senior year hoping it would evaporate or something. And that was a great reward for me to be able to get them over that hump of feeling that way. And I understood it because when I was in high school my lowest grades were in math until my senior year. JK: Oh, really. [00:13:45] MDS: I just kept taking it to keep my dad happy because he's the one that really taught me to think. And if it hadn't been for that I might never have made the master's degree in mathematics. But I never could just get the answer. I had to know why. And that really helped me. So, I could transfer that to other girls, you know, to try to make them see that they could be just as good in math as boys. And we really came out with some good ones. JK: Oh, that's good. And what about your love of chemistry? Where did you pick that up? [00:14:23] MDS: That's what I really wanted to major in. I just fell in love in chemistry even before I took it. (Laughs) And when I did, why, it was just what I wanted. JK: Which high school and college did you go to? [00:14:42] MDS: St. Mary. JK: You went to St. Mary here. MDS: What is the University of St. Mary now was St. Mary College is where I got my bachelor's degree. JK: And where did you go to high school? [00:14:53] MDS: In Parsons, Kansas. JK: Oh, ok. Ok. So, you must have had good teachers along the way. MDS: Pardon. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 7 of 19 JK: You must have had good teachers along the way. [00:15:06] MDS: I did have some very good teachers. JK: And were they Sisters or not? [00:15:10] MDS: No. I was in a public high school. JK: Oh, you were in public high school. MDS: Uh-huh. JK: Ok. MDS: And we did have good teachers, and we did have good discipline. JK: Oh, that's good. Yes. MDS: But I always had an attraction for foreign language. I just didn't have room to get it into the schedule, you know. So, I was happy when I was able to take German here, and that was because I was looking at medical technology. German would have been a requirement. JK: Did you ever consider being a doctor as opposed to…? MDS: Oh, yes. I did. That's what I really wanted to do. My mother convinced me that no one would ever have any faith in a woman doctor. JK: Oh. That's sad. MDS: So, we dropped that and went to med tech. That was… (Laughs) JK: Oh, ok. But it was true in those days. [00:16:05] MDS: In those days she was right. She would be surprised if she knew what there were today. JK: Right. Right. You also taught German. MDS: Yes. JK: And, as we discussed before the interview you're reviewing it now on your iPad. [00:16:28] MDS: I'm reviewing, yes. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 8 of 19 JK: You also said you had four chances to speak it. Can you tell about learning it and the chances you had to speak it? [00:16:40] MDS: It wasn't so much a chance to speak as to teach. What was available at the time I taught German you could get the tapes that went with the textbook. And so the students got native speakers on those. JK: Oh, that's good. MDS: And that was a big help because I hadn't had much conversation, and so I could concentrate on the other part and then use the tapes for conversation. JK: So, can you tell me about studying German on your iPad? [00:17:26] MDS: About what? JK: About studying German on your iPad. Do they have…? MDS: Oh, it isn't German. It's Russian I have on the iPad. JK: Oh, it's Russian. MDS: My German, I just brought along a text book to review with, but I found out that I know almost as much now as I knew then. I think it just sort of soaked in during the years. So, I enjoy both. JK: And have you picked up the Russian alphabet? [00:17:57] MDS: Yes. The Russian alphabet isn't as much an obstacle as people think it is. It looks terrible but actually it isn't that bad. I mean you could learn that pretty quickly. There are some things about the Russian language that are even easier than some others. For instance, there are no definite or indefinite articles. I mean no "a," "an," or "the." JK: Really. MDS: You just say, "John doctor." I mean you say, "Ivan doctor." And then you just fill in Ivan is a doctor. So, there are several things that are easier. There are some that are harder. Every noun has six endings. That's kind of hard. JK: That is. MDS: Yes, six endings depending upon the case. Therefore, you never worry about word order. You can use any word order because if that ending means its stated case and so, you know. But �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 9 of 19 that is kind of an obstacle to learn six endings. And then there are only two conjugations of verbs. The first one's easy; the second one's messy. It has a lot of, what's the word I want, where you change the rules a little bit. I can't think of it. JK: Flexibility. MDS: What? JK: Flexibility? [00:19:36] MDS: No, not flexibility. Exceptions. JK: Oh exceptions. Oh, ok. MDS: Like English has lots of them, you know. JK: Right. MDS: That second conjugation has lots of exceptions. JK: Oh, does it? Irregular. MDS: Yes. JK: Irregular verbs. Yes. In the '70s you served on the SCL Personnel Board… MDS: Yes. JK: …as its secondary education representative. [00:20:07] MDS: Yes. JK: What did you do in that role? [00:20:10] MDS: The Personnel Board was sort of an experiment where the people in each section, like secondary ed., elementary ed., voted on a representative. But the thing I found I didn't really… We didn't have just what we were supposed to be doing definitely laid out, and it was because it was an experiment, and so I felt a little at ease (verbatim) not knowing just what I was supposed to be doing. And then because it was a voted thing. There were people who would rather have had somebody else, and that always made it a little difficult. But we got through it. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 10 of 19 JK: Oh, I see. Have you ever served as a chapter representative? [00:21:07] MDS: Yes, I did. JK: Oh, you did. MDS: One year we had a two-year session of the chapter and I did serve on that one. It was a good experience. JK: What kind of issues did you face? Do you remember? [00:21:23] MDS: We worked on problems of the community and where we were headed. We had different groups and I chose to work on the spirituality one. There was one on governance. I don't remember what the third one was. But it was for the future of the community, where we wanted to go and how we were going to get there. (Laughs) JK: When did you do that about? [00:21:52] MDS: Oh, goodness. I know I was in Topeka at that time so it must have been quite a little while ago. Let's just leave it at that. JK: Ok. Ok. So, it was prior to the time… Were there still a lot of young women entering the community? [00:22:24] MDS: Quite a few, yes. Quite a few. JK: Yes. So, you had other issues. In 1979 you went into school administration. You became principal of Sacred Heart in Fall City, Nebraska. How was your experience as principal and did you miss teaching or were you teaching also? [00:22:39] MDS: Well, I was doing both. (Laughter) MDS: It was a small high school, very small. JK: Ok. MDS: So, yes, I usually taught what you would consider a half schedule. And the principalship wasn't too much of a job because it was a very small school. They didn't have everything, you know, that big schools have. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 11 of 19 But administration is not my favorite thing. It's all right if I'm not the top man on the totem pole but… Now, in Topeka that was a larger high school, and we had kind of an administrative board. And each one of us, the four of us, I think… The principal was a priest, and then we had one who took care of activities. I had curriculum, so I did the master schedule and all the scheduling, and I loved doing that. That was mathematical, you know. (Laughs) And then I taught there also and some really good students in Topeka. JK: Oh, really. MDS: Uh-huh. JK: Do you have any memories of particular students or particular classes? [00:24:04] MDS: What's that? JK: I said do you have any memories of certain students or classes? [00:24:09] MDS: Oh, yes. Yes, I do. And, believe it or not, since I've been back here retired, I've had several come to visit me. JK: Oh, you have. MDS: Yes, from way back. JK: Really. MDS: From Topeka and from North Kansas City. JK: Oh, that's great. MDS: And then one from Hogan High School which is in Kansas City. That's rewarding. Teachers don't have day-to-day rewards, you know, and it's so nice when students come back and say your fourth year math class got me through Creighton or whatever it was. Things like that. JK: Oh, that's very nice. You live here now, don't you? MDS: I do. I live in Ross Hall. JK: Yes. Can you describe your experience teaching at St. Mary's? [00:25:03] MDS: At the college? �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 12 of 19 JK: Yes. MDS: You know there's not an awful lot of difference between a college freshman and a high school senior. That isn't that I had all freshman, but I really didn't feel like it was that much different. There was difference in scheduling. We had night courses. Things like that. But on the whole I didn't really find it… Well, there was this difference. In high school you have more time in the classroom and less time preparing. In college it's just the reverse. You spend more time preparing and less time in the classroom. JK: Right. MDS: So, that was a difference but not a hard one to do. If the class was there to be taught you put in the time getting ready for it, so your day turned out about the same. JK: Which did you enjoy more, college or high school? [00:26:07] MDS: I think high school. JK: Really. MDS: I think I did. But I had more time in high school than I had at the college too. So, I don't know. I think the kids that age I really liked. I really, really felt at home with them. JK: Why? What did you like about them? Because a lot of people are not so fond of teenagers. [00:26:38] MDS: Here's one example from… This one was at St. Pius X in North Kansas City. On April Fools' Day, or before it, the kids had planned that at a certain signal in this one class they were going to all put on dark glasses. Someone tipped me off, and so I put my dark glasses in my pocket. We were still in the habit then. And I recognized the signal and so I turned around while they put on theirs and then I turned around and faced them with my dark glasses. JK: (Laughs) MDS: And they were the kind of people that you could enjoy. They were just really good students and I could enjoy them. And other little things like that came up and I could just enjoy them. JK: That's wonderful. You're probably—I think you are—the most senior Sister that we're interviewing this week. MDS: I think I am. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 13 of 19 JK: I think you are. By the way you don't look 95. MDS: Well, that's nice. JK: No, you look like you're in your seventies. MDS: Well, people have told me that but… JK: So, you joined in 1940. MDS: I did. JK: So, that's a long time ago. And you've seen a lot of changes in training ministries… MDS: Oh, my. JK: …community culture and changes brought about by Vatican II. What are some of the changes that you've experienced before and after Vatican II brought on by Vatican II? [00:28:24] MDS: When they first started, when the changes first started, I wasn't one to get out in the front lines on any of those things. For instance, like the change in the habit. I would have been happy just to stay like we were. But it was moving along, and it was kind of a tension time in our community because there were those who wanted to and then there were ones who didn't want to change. And then just gradually some of our other customs were mitigated. You know, we were in bed at nine o'clock and things like that. So many of those little rules were changed, and I thought for the good. JK: The old rule was that everybody went to bed at nine o'clock. MDS: Pardon me. JK: The old rule was that everyone went to bed at nine o'clock. [00:29:18] MDS: They did in the schools anyway—the ones that taught. And we had 60-some odd grade schools at that time and nine high schools, so that would be a lot of people who went to bed at nine o'clock. JK: Yes. I wonder how they got all their work done. MDS: In fact, I had to get special permission the year before I took my orals at Notre Dame to stay up 'til 9:15 so that I could review. (Laughs) JK: Oh, my heavens. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 14 of 19 MDS: And, you know, those things like that just gradually disappeared, and, in my opinion, the Sisters are happier now than I've ever seen them. JK: I can imagine. What were some of the other changes that were welcome to you? [00:30:04] MDS: Being able to go home to see your parents. I only lived… Parsons, Kansas isn't that far from here, and I didn't get to go home for 11 years. I was in 11 years before… Well, see, that all gradually changed. And I got to go lots of times after that. JK: Right. I can understand why some parents were reluctant to send their daughters off. MDS: Yes. Right. (Laughs) JK: They'll never see them again practically. [00:30:47] MDS: Yes, that's right. That didn't mean I didn't see them. They could come visit me. JK: Oh, they could come visit you. MDS: They could visit me. I just couldn't go back to my own home. And, as I say, we only lived 130 miles, so. JK: That's awful. Did any of the changes require some adjustment for you? [00:31:09] MDS: Oh, I think so. Yes. But they came gradually. So, I'll tell you one of the biggest adjustments for me was the music in church. And now, of course, I think it's great. I mean there is so much better music now. But some of the first attempts I thought were pretty bad. I love classical music and so what they were turning up with… I almost walked out one day. (Laughter) MDS: But gradually that got better. The good musicians got in on it and the church music hymns got a lot better. Now I think they're wonderful. JK: Oh, good. Good. So, you're involved in a prayer ministry now. Can you tell us about that? [00:32:05] MDS: I don't know really what you mean by that because it wasn't a ministry in the sense of going out and working with other people. It was just my own spiritual life. JK: Right. Right. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 15 of 19 MDS: I had time, you know with... But for one thing I broke my ankle, no, my leg once while I was in Topeka, I think. Well, wherever I was and I had to come to the Mother House to recuperate because our house halls were too narrow for a wheel chair. No, I believe it was when I was in Grand Junction, Colorado. That's when it was. And I had time then to pray and to think, and I think my own spiritual life developed at that time. And there were some people that I did influence. If you talk about a ministry I didn't really set it up as a prayer ministry but there were some people that I was close to that we had conversations about prayer and different types of prayer and so on. But some people have that prayer ministry as really their job, you know. JK: Right. So, it's an individual thing for you. [00:33:33] MDS: That's right and the few people that I influenced by the fact that they were my friends. JK: Well, the SCL community does so much active work but prayer plays a role also. So, can you say a little bit about how prayer reflects on the community and on yourself? [00:34:00] MDS: How prayer reflects on the community. JK: Yes. MDS: I think our community has always been very prayerful. But I think one of the things that was important to me, because I was at a point in my earlier life when I was very dissatisfied with my own prayer life, and we had just very limited books that we could use and then gradually it got so that we could choose our own, you know, and things like that. And that was a big step forward for me. But finally over a period of, maybe, six years, more than that, I got into what's called Centering Prayer. And that was really worked out by three Trappist priests. They saw a more contemplative type of prayer being… There were people that really desired that type of prayer, and they were running off to India and Japan and China to find those things, and these three Trappists said we have that in our own. We just have to find a way to make it available to people and not just religious, to all, anybody who wanted it. So, they worked out this little plan with four steps to it. And then they started experimenting with it, and I happened to make a retreat here by one of the ones on that group, and he just threw it out as an experiment. But it resonated with me. It was kind of what I was looking for. And he didn't call it Centering Prayer then. It was just this method. But, you know, that in 35 years that it's been going it is now in 50 countries. In other words, it has just taken hold like everything. And it's for everybody—Catholic, Protestant, anybody that wants to, you know. It's not limited to any race or religion or anything. So, it has just spread like wildfire. �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 16 of 19 And so they have an organization. They call it Contemplative Outreach. And they have headquarters in most cities, and it's just grown and I've grown with it. JK: Well. That's interesting. MDS: I mean it has really been what I needed. JK: Have other people taken it up here? MDS: Oh, yes. (Laughs) JK: Oh, really. MDS: Oh, yes. If it has spread to 50 countries there have to be a lot of people there. But in our own it's… One of our Sisters was head of the group in Denver. And if you could see their publication you would see where it is. Father Thomas Keating is sort of the head one there and he has written numerous books. I mean there's plenty that people could read on it. But it has spread very, very rapidly. JK: That's interesting. When did you retire? [00:37:31] MDS: Let's see. Oh, I retired from the college after 12 years, and then I still wasn't ready just to sit down. So, I looked around and one day our table up where I was living… I was living in Mead Hall. We had a group of six Sisters living together there, and that was another new thing— to get away from this large community living and into smaller groups. A lot of people really wanted that. And there was a list of some openings at the Marillac Clinic in Grand Junction, Colorado. And I looked at the four and I knew three were not in my realm of being able to do. So, one of them was bookkeeper. I had never taken a business course but numbers, you know. JK: Right. MDS: I thought I surely could add, subtract, multiply and divide. So, I interviewed for it and took it. So, I spent 16 years in Grand Junction, Colorado working at the Marian Clinic… Marillac Clinic for people who had no insurance or very little insurance. And besides doing bookkeeping I did a lot of other things too. And I loved those 16 years. I wouldn't give those up for anything and it's from there then that I retired. JK: And when was that? [00:39:17] MDS: Oh, let's see. Let's see. I've been here two years, so the 16 years before the two years I was here. JK: Oh, ok. Ok. So, you retired a couple of years ago then. [00: 39:39] �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 17 of 19 MDS: Yes. JK: Yes. MDS: I didn't work full-time at Marillac in Grand Junction. I really worked a half schedule. JK: Oh, ok. Well, that's good. MDS: Because I was getting on, but that was a wonderful. Loved Grand Junction. The people are wonderful there. And it was just a very good experience. JK: How did you feel about retiring and coming back here? [00:40:06] MDS: By the time that I did retire and came back here I was ready to because I knew that I needed more help to live and medical help and I knew it was time. I hated to leave Grand Junction but I really knew I needed to. And, of course, this is a wonderful place. Ross Hall wasn't finished when I came but I've grown with it, so. (Laughs) JK: Oh, good, good. So, it hasn't… MDS: So, I'm very happy. JK: It hasn't been too difficult a transition. [00:40:50] MDS: No, it really hasn't, not as hard as it's been for some people, I think. The Sister I was living with in Grand Junction, it's very hard for her. She had been there for a long time and had lots of friends. And it was very hard for her. JK: Yes. Since you were working in healthcare as a bookkeeper, but, nonetheless, you were surrounded by others working in healthcare… MDS: Yes. JK: …what do you think of what's going on in Washington right now with the healthcare legislation? You're rolling your eyes. (Laugh) [00:41:27] MDS: That's all I can do. I almost stopped listening to it. I just get so upset. It isn't worth it. (Laughs) I can't imagine how the American people put that man in office, but they did. JK: Hard to realize. Hard to understand. [00:41:50] �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 18 of 19 MDS: It is. I'm sure some of them regret it. (Inaudible) to. But I don't know where we're headed in healthcare or… But if that bill of his goes through all kinds of poor people are going to lose their healthcare. Medicaid is going to go down the road. JK: Yes. And so people will die. MDS: That's right. JK: Because of (inaudible). [00:42:16] MDS: At Marillac Clinic we had Medicaid for our dental. The rest of it was all medical, and we had a wonderful program for mental health where a person could see a medical provider and a mental health provider on the same visit. And those were all poor people. Travel wasn't easy for them, you know. So, that was a great boon for them. Today they have, the clinic has, competed for a grant of some kind. I don't understand all the details. But anyway, they got it. They've received it. And right now they have doubled the number of people they were seeing before. It's flourishing. JK: Oh, good. MDS: That makes me happy. JK: Well, it's a short-term benefit anyway. [00:43:10] MDS: Yes. JK: Yes. MDS: So, that was an important part of my life, those 16 years in Grand Junction. JK: It must have been. Would you like to add anything to what we've talked about? [00:43:30] MDS: I don't know. I think you pretty well covered it. JK: Oh, I have one more question. MDS: All right. JK: What do you see as the future of SCL? MDS: Of…? �Sisters of Charity, Leavenworth, Kansas Transcription of Sister Mary Denise Sternizke Interviewed by Jane Kenamore, June 28, 2017 Transcribed by Jessie Lehman, September 4, 2017 Page 19 of 19 JK: SCL, the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth. [00:43:44] MDS: Well, we're surely not getting a lot of new members but neither are most of the other communities. It's because lay people can do a lot more things, I think, than they used to. They didn't have to join a religious community to do them. And I don't know what the future of SCL is except that the spirit is so wonderful. When I came home I thought I would find Sisters sitting in rocking chairs waiting to die. That is not the case. I mean these people are just doing all kinds of things in Leavenworth and in Kansas City. They're active. It was just a wonderful revelation. I can't see how something like that is going to die out. JK: Oh, thank you. That's a wonderful perception. [00:44:30] MDS: I think some way or other God's going to find us a way to continue, but I don't know how. JK: Others have said the same thing. In one way or another things will… the community will continue. ### � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Sternitzke, S. Mary Denise Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Kenamore, Jane Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data MPEG Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 45:06:00 Location The location of the interview Digital Sisters Files Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sternitzke, S. Mary Denise, Oral History, 6/28/2017 Subject The topic of the resource Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth, Teaching, School Administration, College Teaching Description An account of the resource She speaks warmly of her family. Her father was overjoyed when she joined the Community. Her mother had reservations, but grew to be very proud of her daughter's call to religious life. Initially, Sister taught in elementary schools and struggled with this age group. As she speaks of her transition to high school students, you can hear her voice change. She loved working with these students and inspiring them to overcome their fear of math and science. Her stories illustrate a lifelong commitment to educating herself. As math and science research progressed, she did graduate work in mathematics, chemistry, and physics in order to better teach these subjects. She talks about her love of languages. She studied German earlier in life, and in retirement, she was tackling Russian on her iPad. Other topics include her transition to school administration, college teaching, and Leadership positions as Secondary Education Representative on the Personnel Board and a Chapter representative. Sister also spends a good deal of time speaking about her relationship to prayer throughout her life. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sternitzke, S. Mary Denise; Kenamore, Jane Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 6/28/2017 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource All rights belong to the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource MP3 Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Oral History Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Sternitzke, S. Mary Denise Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1922-2017 Education Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/21d8b39e3f641ac04e2d5068965d47f0.jpg e74a5b3b99e9e265169472d395088696 https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/4fffeecf907ebcd95cc4ddff7f17cd86.pdf b8fb22da842049380c4ceefac844937f PDF Text Text INTERVIEW WITH SISTER CHARLES MIRIAM STRASSEL DATED 3/16/93 INTERVIEWER: SISTER JUDITH METZ My mother was Mary Bump, I think her father was an Englishman. She was 32 years old when she married Clarence Strassel. Her first child was born on the 30th of October probably 1907. She lost him with diarrhea which we called Summer Complaint in those days. He was only 9 months old and my mother never got over that death. She used to have his little clothes and she always cried whenever she saw them. Then three years later she had my brother Charles. She always had wanted a little girl. She was 39 when I was born, and she thought that God was very good to her. She told me that she took me and offered me to the Blessed Mother when I was baptized. I was born on June 10, 1912 at 11 o’clock in the morning and it was a Monday morning. She had her tubs out to do her wash and she said: “Clarence, put the tubs away, the baby is coming. Of course all these births were at home, so my aunt, her sister, Aunt Katie came over and helped with birth along with the country doctor who was down in Delhi. This was lower Delhi, it is now called Saylor Park and I was born in a little house 114 Meridian St. down in lower Delhi. I was named after my two grandmothers. I wish Mom would have let me have Johanna because her mother’s name was Johanna, but she called me Josephine, Catherine Josephine. She said I was always to carry that “J”, now, but I dropped the “J”, I never wrote my name that way but if you punched me out in the computer, the “J” would come up. She thought after my birth that she would lose me because they couldn’t find a formula that was agreeing with me, but finally they found a formula that agreed with me because I was very thin. She was praying very hard that she wouldn’t lose me.... anyhow, I survived. I went to St. Aloysius on the Ohio to grade school. In 1918, the time of the flu that took so many lives, it was such a terrible winter, the Ohio River froze over. The Oldenburg Sisters taught us. They took the whole school across the river, we walked across the river. Mom said: “You can’t go unless your father goes with you.” So, Dad came along and we walked across the Ohio River. She used to put pants on me that were Charlie’s so that I would keep warm. We always had a nice warm home, it was four rooms. We had no running water. It was 1939, I guess, before Mom ever got running water in the house. We had a wonderful cistern outside, the water was wonderful, very good tasting water. �2 I can remember when we were growing up that we had lamps, because there was no electricity. We had no medicines at all, so when we had a bad cold, Mom always had three barrels of wine in the cellar that she made herself. We had elderberry wine, we had grape wine, and there was another kind that we had. And if we had a bad cold, Mom would heat some wine and give it to Charlie and myself. The only medicines we had was what was thrown on the porch. But, we all survived. Dad only went to the fourth grade in school, and Mom went to the sixth grade. Mom was born in a log cabin close to the Ohio River in Northbend. Dad was born in upper Delhi. Grandpa Strassel had a big farm. The farm is where St. Atoninus is at present. I used to love to go up there and stay all night with grandma because we had to go upstairs to bed with a lamp. What impressed me was going upstairs, because we just had a four room house. Her little kitchen tablecloths were blue and white and the red and white I always liked them. They were red and white check and blue and white check. I used to love that because we didn’t have those table cloths. Grandpa would let me ride the horses bareback when he brought them to drink. Then we used to go into the barn and slide down the hay. He also had a smokehouse where they smoked their own sausage. It was a large place. Before Grandpa’s first wife died , three children were born: William Strassel, Louella Strassel and Clarence Strassel, my Dad. And then, Grandpa remarried and he had about six boys, no girls. Aunt Louella married and she had three daughters, Lillian, who became Sister Mary Donald in the Oldenburg community, and two others. Lillian entered 7 years before I did. I had been wishing that I could go with her, but I was just in grade school and I knew that I had to wait. But I really knew that I wanted to be a Sister when I was in 3rd or 4th grade. I graduated from the 8th grade at St. Aloysius in 1926. As time when on, I knew that I wanted to enter a Community, so I asked Mom if I could come to the Mount to school, because my cousin had graduated from the Academy in 1924 and I used to come up when she was here. Mom and I took a traction car to St. Joseph’s stop down here below the Mount and we walked up the steps which came out just beyond the cemetery. And so, we came up to register. For a boarder, it was $300 a year. There were also day-students. Another girl from my class came up as a day-student. She came up here by bus. There were four of us that roomed in a dormitory all four years that I was here at the Academy: Helen Kiley, Mary Sulfsted, and Mary Hesselbrock. We still are very good friends. We get together every so often. �3 WHAT DID YOUR DAD DO? My poor Dad worked on the railroad most of the time, doing the hard work. Sometimes jobs were so hard to find, he did anything he could, but he mostly worked on the railroad. During World War I, they would open the railroad cars, and people would go down there and take what they wanted out of the cars because coffee was rationed and sugar was rationed. Even though this was prohibition time, Mom used to sell her wine, and Charlie and I would deliver it. We were never caught. She was also a wonderful pie baker and she used to sell her pies also, and Charlie and I would deliver them. WHO WERE SOME OF THE SISTERS THAT YOU KNEW WHEN YOU WERE UP HERE IN THE ACADEMY? When I first came, Sister Elizabeth Seton was Directress, Sister Thomas Aquinas taught Science, and also they sent Sister Mary Leo over as a Postulant and she taught over in the Academy. Sister Mary Bernice also taught over there as a Postulant. Her sister was in the Academy, too. The second year, Sister Deodata was the “angel” that meant that she was with the girls whenever they were not in class... {here she struggled with a name... saying that this was a person with whom she had lots of fun... they were always getting into things that they weren’t supposed to}... then she remembered.... Margo (Margaret) Schmidter and I were trouble makers, I guess. At least the first year at the Academy. In the dining room we always rotated every week from one table to another. We changed our table cloths, so we could learn how to pass the dishes, we were also trained to be “ladies”. Margo Schmidter, this particular time, was sitting at the head of the table, and I was to her right. She knew I loved chocolate pudding, so instead of giving me a dish, she took the dish she had the bowl of chocolate pudding and she was filling it for me. It was getting up there to the rim of the dish, and I said:”Margo, stop now because it is going to run over.” But she kept filling it, and so I put my hand over the bowl so that she would stop, and she put it all over my hand. We had linen napkins (we always had a Sister walking up and down the dining room) so, I took the linen napkin and put it on my hand. Sister Marie Corona was the one walking up and down, and she saw this. She came over and she said: “Don’t eat it, don’t eat a bite out of that dish until I get Sister Marie Damien.” So, Margo began to cry... she could cry at the drop of a hat...So Sister Marie Damien came and gave us a talk. She said to me that I would get 50 in deportment, and I did that month. My mother wanted to know what that meant, so I told her the story. Margo Schmidter was a dear person. �4 Mom and Dad had it hard, but the first year, Mom paid for me. But, I thought if I asked the Sisters if I couldn’t work my way through so she wouldn’t have to do it. The Sisters let me. I used to come down before meals and help put the food on the table, and bring the pans in, because we washed dishes, just like the Sisters did at the table and then we would take the pans out and empty them. And then, on Saturdays I’d come down and we would take all the sugar out of the sugar bowls and wash them, also the salt and peppers, then we would refill them. We would crumb the tables after all the meals. So it wasn’t hard work at all. But anyhow I wanted to do that because it was too hard on Mom and Dad. We had a marvelous time and it was very good. One day, eight bells rang in the Academy and that meant that everybody had to go to the study hall. Sister Elizabeth Seton came in, and the desk was on a platform...the study hall was where the Rose Room is. She said, “close every door... close every window..(I was about two desks from her) and she said that Sister Deodata (who at this particular time was “angel”) had said : “I just heard a girl calling up from the first floor to the fourth floor, ‘Is Deo up there?’ She said, “ Do you know what that means? That means God. “ And she said: “That Sister, that’s all she has is her name”... and she went on and went on... And so, when I got the habit ... we did it different that year... we went in dressed as Postulants and then we got the bundle of the habit and we went out to the Novitiate and dressed and came back in. And then, they called out the names, and then on our way out we got the Constitutions. Well, I got out there and I took the bundle of the habit. The next morning, which was Easter Sunday, 1931 when I was dressing, I looked at the habit before I put it on and I thought this is all I have, no more, just this. And so, I recalled what Sister Elizabeth Seton had said that day. We had a girl in our class, her name was Hildegard Durr... once we got called in study hall for this too...she was steaming her hair and that was out of order too. But with it all, we had lots and lots of fun. In 1929 we had the hundredth anniversary of the Community. And all the girls had to go to one end of the hall on the fourth floor to give up our rooms to the Sisters who would come in for the 3-day celebration: one day was for the religious, and then one was for the public, and the other for the priests, I guess. �5 Mom always liked the Sisters of Charity because they were always out-going, and I liked that too. The Oldenburg Sisters were more reserved. I thought that if I went to Oldenburg, I would miss the Mount. Now I didn’t know Oldenburg itself, so I thought, I am going to the Mount, because I couldn’t miss Oldenburg because I didn’t know it. I graduated June 5, 1930. We always gave a class play. We had a Miss Cook who was the dramatic teacher, and the name of the play was Pharaoh’s Daughter. She picked me to play the part of Pharaoh’s daughter. I had 10 pages (I could memorize like anything in those days). She gave me 10 legal size sheets that I had to memorize. So, we practiced, and practiced and practiced. The play went OK, I found Moses in the basket. My dear little mother was there for it. After it was over, we went out to bow and all, and Mom came up and gave me a bouquet of flowers...that cost her money, and I said “Mom, you didn’t have to do that” and I kissed her. But she was always so proud of me. I was raised on much love, and I think that means so much to a person later in life. I went to S. Thomas Aquinas before I left school and I told her that I would like to enter and so she arranged for Mother Irenea to meet me in the parlor. So, I saw Mother Irenea and I told that I wanted to come in September. I knew that if I stayed home longer than September, I wouldn’t have been able to come I don’t think. Then she gave me the papers and I filled them out and I sent them back. It was only about a week later when I got papers that I was accepted. So, we did a lot of things together (Mom and I) and she got somebody to make my clothes... a dear friend down there so that I didn’t have to bring all these bolts of things because we were poor and I didn’t have to bring $100 either. Sister Thomas Aquinas had in her mind that I should take all this Science things, and I hated Chemistry and Biology I could have done without that too. But, she felt that I was fit for this and so she insisted that I take it in the Academy. And she insisted that if I wanted to be a Sister of Charity I had to take Chemistry. So I took it. And when I entered, I had to take it too. She had in mind, I guess, medical technology or something like that. I was told to be here at 3:00 o’clock in the afternoon on September 6. Now, September 6 was a Saturday, she had to teach school. So I guess that was the reason for it. So I told my Mom that I would have to be up there at 3 o’clock. I don’t even remember who brought me. I know that Mom came with me. Dad didn’t want me to come although he loved me very much. �6 So, September 6th I came in and I asked to see Sister Thomas Aquinas. They put us in the parlor and she told me that she would take me over to get dressed. There was green carpet out there in front of the chapel and no one could ever go over that green carpet so that was quite a thing for me. She took me in the back of the chapel and told me to make my offering now. So, I made my offering of my life. Then she took me upstairs to get dressed and then I went back down ( I have all these pictures of that) and I was very happy. So then we sat there for a little while and then Mom left. SO YOU WERE THE ONLY ONE THAT ENTERED THAT DAY? Yes. Somebody came in on the 7th . Julienne came before me, because I am between them in priority. Mom never missed visiting Sunday. She asked me what she should call me now. I said, “Mom, call me what you have always called me, you don’t have to say Sister.” (of course, I had had my pre-novitiate in the Academy, because we couldn’t talk after the De Profundis at twenty minutes to nine, and if you talked you had to sit out in the hall. It was almost like a novitiate in those days But, I was happy. I’ve been happy all my life because I received so much love.) WHAT WAS THAT STORY YOU TOLD ME THE OTHER DAY ABOUT THE SISTER FROM THE ACADEMY WHEN SHE FOUND OUT YOU WERE ENTERING? I came up the summer before I entered. I came up to see Sister Thomas Aquinas about my clothes and about all this other stuff. Sister Elizabeth Seton was Directress, and she was down in her office when I passed, I could see her there, because the door was kind of ajar. During our conversation upstairs, Sister Thomas Aquinas asked me if I had told Sister Elizabeth Seton. I said that I had not. We were always scared of S. Elizabeth Seton... we had to get all these permissions and we were wondering what she was going to say whenever we went into her office... so I told T.A. that I would see her when I went back down because I knew that she was in the office. She told me that that was a courtesy and that I should do so. �7 So, she was still in there, so I rapped on the door and she opened the door and said: “Oh, Catherine, how are you?” I told her that I was fine and she invited me to sit down and we talked a little bit, then I said that I had come to tell her something. I told her that I was going to enter in September and she said: “Enter where?” and I told her that I was going to enter her Community. She said: “Catherine, you’re too young, you’re too immature, you’ll never stay. You won’t stay three months” I said, “Well, Sister, I don’t know the future, but I have given this lots of thought and I’m coming to stay. I realize that I don’t know what is in store for me, but I want to come and I have thought a lot about this.” So we left it at that. I GUESS YOU PROVED HER WRONG ! Yes, I’ll be in 63 years soon. I did respect her and she was quite a lady. She’s not a person that I would “fall in love” with. I admired Thomas Aquinas very much, she was a good teacher. I, myself, was drawn to T.A. One time, before I entered, we had a riding academy down here below the Mount. I kinda wanted to ride a horse. If we weren’t dressed properly, this lady, (T.A.) had us use the back stairs. And, so, I had knickers on to go riding, and when I came back from riding, who did I meet on the stairs but T.A. And, she said : “look at you”. And I said, “I’ve always wanted to ride a horse before I entered”, and so I passed it off like that.. and that’s all she said to me. I was using the right stairs anyway. (I’m going back and forth as things come to me) And then during my novitiate they sent me over to the College and I had to take all that science stuff after the canonical year. I got the habit on April 4, 1931 and by October I had lost 50 lbs. Now I didn’t know that I had lost 50 lbs, I was too busy working and I wasn’t sick. So, one night, on my stand in the novitiate, I found a glass of milk and I thought that this must have gotten in the wrong place. It was sacred silence so I couldn’t do anything about that, so I drank it. A few days after that, Sister Mary Emma called me and told me that I was to go over to Sister Mary Carlos’ office...Mary Carlos was not a nurse, she was treasurer of the Community. I had to go up to her office, up there on the second floor. The parlor to the left as you go in the front door was the Treasurer’s Office. She told me to sit down and open my mouth, and she had a spoon that she put on the top of my tongue and told me to say ahhh, and so I did. Nobody had said anything to me, I didn’t know that I had lost weight. Then she said for me to tell Sister Mary Emma to send me to (not sure about these next few words) Giles DeCourcy?? and so I went to Giles De Courcy. �8 Little Sister Mildred, God love her, she was hardly able to walk, but she was to be my companion. I told Giles DeCourcy that I was not sick, but he examined me and told me that I had an exothalmic {spelling?} thyroid and it has to come out. I asked him to write this on a piece of paper, I have to give this to the Superior. When I came back...Mother Mary Florence was Assistant Mother, so I told her and I told Sister Mary Emma. He had also told me to see Joe De Courcy, his brother. I went to Joe and he said the same thing, an exsothalmic thyroid and it had to come out. There was no room at the Good Samaritan Hospital, so I had to wait. I was given Sister Mary Agnes McCann’s room. They called my mother and she came up, she was worried sick. I was operated on, October 6, 1931 and I’ll never be colder even when I’m put in the grave than I was on that cart going up there. I had never had anything wrong with me. My mother kept saying to my father to go faster because she was afraid I would be in the Operating Room and they wouldn’t be there. I told my Mom not to come to see me the first day, but she could come after that. I was told that the operation was done fifteen minutes. She came the next day and wanted me to go home with her to get built up again. I told her that I couldn’t do that, if I leave the Community, I could not come back. I told her that I was very happy here and that the Sisters are very good to me. I asked her to let me recuperate with them. She understood, but she came every day to see me. I was only in there about 8 days, I didn’t break my Canonical Year At the end of my Canonical Year, Mother Mary Regina, elected in 1931, came into the Novitiate to tell us what we were going to be doing the second year of Novitiate ... I think that was the first time we had a second year Novitiate...this was preparing us for what we would be doing. So, Mother Regina called everybody’s name. When she called my name she told me that I would be going to the Good Samaritan, and go into training to be a nurse. I was delighted. I had been doing a lot of fasting so that I could be a nurse, because I didn’t think I was material to be a teacher. Sister Mary Emma was giving out black veils so we could go out, but she didn’t give me a black veil, so I went up to her and said that I thought Mother had said that I supposed to go in training. Then she told me that it had been changed. Then, I asked what it had been changed to. �9 And she told me that I had to ask Sister Mary Corona. So, I went over to her office and she wasn’t there, so I went over to her bedroom. When she opened the door she said: “Catherine, how are you?” So, I told her that I was fine, and I went through all this again. Then she told me that I was going to the hospital to relieve a laboratory technologist. At that time I didn’t even know that a hospital had a laboratory technologist. So I went to college and got another semester. Then, I was a Junior in good standing when I went to the hospital. Sister Ellen, God love her, she had charge of the laboratory, and she told me to just stand there and observe. Well, it took me 10 minutes to observe and to say that I didn’t want to do this. There were 100 urines there to be examined. There was the smell of paracytology {spelling??} There were cultures, Lord, it smelled terrible. I thought to myself, I can’t do this. So, standing there, I thought that if I said anything I’d probably be sent home, I guess I could try it. I tell people now that I tried it 45 years. That was a blow that almost killed me. So, I worked with Sister Ellen. She loved me to death, I didn’t know this, but she was always so very kind to me that I didn’t know she thought that much of me until Jean Clare went in after me. As soon as Ellen saw Jean Clare, she said that she would never be a Charles Miriam. Jean Clare told me this later. Now Ignatius loved Jean Clare and I don’t think she could stand me. I thought I’d be there a year, and I got into the work even though I didn’t like it, but I thought that I could try it. That following August, I didn’t come out to hear the mission list read. I went downstairs and S. Dorothy Ann was there outside of the chapel reading this list and I said, just for fun, “is my name on that list?”and I looked over her shoulder and my Lord and my God I saw my name there. No less, to go to Colorado Springs to the Glockner That was after 6 months at Good Sam, from January to August. I then thought of my mother. It was customary to go home for a day if you were from the East and you were missioned West. So, I called my mother to tell her that I had been missioned West to Colorado Springs. That poor soul didn’t know where Colorado Springs was. I told her that it was customary that I could go home for a day before I go. I asked her which day would be good for her. She said I could go home any time. I suggested the 16th of August, the day after I came out of retreat. She said, that was fine. So, the 16th of August came and my brother came up for me. At that time we weren’t even supposed to get in a car with our brothers or fathers. It was alright to go in a taxicab not knowing the man at all, alone, that was OK. So I asked Charlie where Mom was. He said that ever since I had called Mom’s had been cleaning and cooking. He said that I was going to have to eat everything I ever liked. That was another problem. So I said,”Jesus, Mary and Joseph, don’t let anybody see me get into this car alone with my brother.” �10 I had made vows by then. I made vows in 1933 and we made them for 3 years. (back to the story of her brother and the car) I sat in front with him because I thought it was crazy to sit in the back. But, see, your family were good enough for you when you were home, but it didn’t make sense. But, anyhow, I got in with Charlie and we went home. And now, before I knew about Mom cooking all that stuff, I had asked if it was alright to eat. I was told that if they had a cold drink or some cookies I was to take it. She didn’t say a thing about a meal. When I got home, Mom had been slaving . We had always eaten at the kitchen table, the four of us, but she had the dining room all set up. She had linen napkins and the four of us were there for dinner. She had everything I ever liked. And I thought to myself, Jesus is the only one that’s here, and I’m not going to hurt my mother, I’m going to eat anything and everything. And I did. So we had this beautiful meal and then they took me back at the end of the day. We left for Colorado Springs toward the last part of August, because we got there on Retreat Sunday, the first Sunday of September. We went to Cincinnati to board the train. Earlier, I had been told that I was going alone and another Sister was going to get on in Indianapolis. She had been to visit her family. She was going to Albuquerque. Well, my mother was at the depot with this care package, all kinds of food, jellies, etc. And she asked my why I had not told her that I was going {at this point Sister’s voice got very soft, almost a whisper and could not be heard clearly}. Sister Margaret Jane had given me some tips about travelling. Margaret Jane came into my life when I went to the Good Samaritan. There were 72 nuns there at that time. After night prayers she used to wait at the door of chapel and she would invite me to go take a walk on the roof. Coming from the Novitiate, here I was with all these people around me, and there was nobody there. She was very kind to me. �11 When I got on the train, I remembered that Margaret Jane told me that the busman would come to the car and take me over to the other station because we were to transfer to the Santa Fe station. So, Sister got on at Indianapolis. She told me that she was glad she was coming with me, because she knew we would have a good time. Her name was Helen Miriam, she was a cousin of one of our Sister. But, Helen Miriam didn’t stay in the Community. Margaret Jane had told me that they give plenty of food on the train, and that if I asked for only one helping there should be enough for both of us. Well, I thought I could not do that...asking for a plate for her and then ask for only one helping?... I can’t do that... We just let things go on as usual, but when the size of the helpings came Helen Miriam said that she could not eat all of that. I told her that if she couldn’t eat it, I would eat it. Mary Carlos had only given us one berth. We had one berth for both of us to get into and we had all these clothes. She had just made her first vows and she had her good habit with her. So, I said for her to get in first, then I got in. We had to drape all these things around us, veils and all these things, in one berth. Well, some time during the night, I felt something itching me in my back. Finally, she woke up. So, I got out of the berth, covered with the curtain, and realized that it was her cap and veil, the starchy thing was scratching me. She was so upset. I asked her if she had another cap and we would go into one of these vacant rooms and I would drape your veil. So, we got up early and we went into one of those rooms and I fixed her veil. Well, there was no air conditioning in those days if you opened one of the windows on the train, you got all this soot coming in on you. I had three guimps and one was not usable because we had been in the diner one night and I spilled a cup of coffee all over myself. So, that one was gone. We were a sight to be seen when we reached Colorado Springs. We were two nights and a day on this train. I didn’t know where I was going, so if it wasn’t for signs all around in the station we would never have gotten here. DID ANYBODY MEET YOU ? Oh, yes. �12 So when we were pulling in to Colorado Springs, S. Mary Harrison who was the Superior/Administrator was there. And, if there was any woman that I dearly it was her, she was a real mother. She was a lovely lady. CAN YOU SAY SOME MORE ABOUT SISTER MARY HARRISON? She was such a sweet person, she was so dear. I was there two years, and at the end of the two years I was supposed to make my perpetual vows... in 1936... Two days before I was supposed to go to Pueblo to make my retreat and perpetual vows,I had not yet gotten the letter of permission. When Mother Regina had come before, I had knelt down and asked her to make perpetual vows. I went to Sister Mary Harrison and I told her that I had not received the letter. She asked me if had mailed it, and I said I had. Then she said that I would not have to worry. Mary was always so dear, she’d take us up in the mountains to get trees for Christmas. She was always taking us out to the mountains for picnics etc. She was very kind to all the Sisters. She was very compassionate, everybody loved her. So any how I got permission so I went to Pueblo. My mother and my brother came out for the ceremony. My father did not come, he really didn’t want me to enter. He had said that he would never come to see me, but he did. The ceremony was held at the old St. Mary’s hospital in August of 1936. Sister Jane Theresa was Superior/Administrator there. There were five us that were all from the East, but they did not bring us home that year. There was Martina, Mary Canice, Mary Jude who was on mission in Santa Fe, and it was known that she was a tubercular so she had been held back. Sister Marie Genevieve was her Superior and told her that she had to go rest every afternoon. And, because she rested, she was held back. And then there was Sister Adeline who came from St. Rita’s. Each one of us said our vows as we knelt at the Communion Rail. Sister Mary Angus Barry also made that retreat. At the end of the retreat I was missioned to Trinidad. The day I got there, we had some reading and then she (Sister Mary) rang the bell and announced that the new Sisters had arrived and she proceeded to introduce us. So, she introduced Sister Helen Miriam first and said that Sister was going on to Albuquerque, and Sister Charles Miriam is staying here to help Sister Thomas and she is also going to learn X-ray. �13 I thought to myself, I haven’t taken physics, I’ll be electrocuted, I’m sure. I was helping Sister Thomas and there was also a lay person there who was excellent at her work and she taught me everything I know about X-ray. So I was both lab tech and x-ray and I took night call when needed. To me, to be holy, was not to say anything unless somebody asked me a question. Well, that didn’t last long. I had a couple of people working for me. I had to go into the x-ray room and practice what I was going to say because I was not sure just what I was doing. The x-ray unit there at that time must have been on Noah’s ark, it was horrible. Whenever I put my foot to take a picture, it would spark over. It was a real old one. In those days, we had to take the wires down and attach them to the tube, and we had three different tubes, a 100, a 30 and a 10, according to whatever you were taking, you had to change the tube and that was different for me had never had to do that at Glockner. At times, I didn’t know whether I’d be killed or the patient on the table would be killed. So, I went to Sister Alexander who was the Superior. She was a lovely lady, she was wonderful, she loved the poor. Any how I went to her and told her that we just had to get another x-ray unit. She told me that we didn’t have any money. I asked her if I could get the money, would it be OK. And she said yes. So, I went in and out of every store in Trinidad. I don’t remember this, but Sister Agnes Patricia said that I had gone to the mines and when the men came out of the mines on pay day I would get some money. Just like our earlier Sisters did to build that hospital. Well, it was about $19,000 to get a unit I collected that amount. Everybody was so good to the Nuns, they just loved the Nuns. I went in and out of every business in town, of course, every other door was a bar but that didn’t make any difference to me. I was bold in those days, I was bold enough because we needed that unit. Well, we got the unit, it was a General Electric unit and they put it in for me, and that following August, I was missioned. I had been there from 1936 to 1940 then I was missioned to Albuquerque. There are a lot of stories about Trinidad. There a number of young Jesuit priests down there and they were so good. They needed an outlet too, so they used to come up and visit and we used to have a good time. They were wonderful guys. �14 On Sundays we would go up and teach Catechism. Mary Jude went with me and Father {name not clear} would come up and pick us up, take us to Ludlow, and Mr Brunelli would then take us (this is the twin Brunelli’s father) and he used to take us up into the mountains to this little town. When we arrived we would ring the bell and have catechism lessons right in the little church there every Sunday. Then Mr.Brunelli would bring us back down and Father would collect us from there. He took some of the other Sisters to some other little town. ABOUT HOW MANY SISTERS WERE ON MISSION AT THE HOSPITAL WHEN YOU WERE THERE? About 16 or 17. We had a cook, Sister Marie Carmel was in charge of the buying, we had a Sister in the operating room, Sister Agnes Patricia, and she would take care of the maternity also. We had a Sister on the first floor and one on the second floor and one in the pharmacy, I was in the lab and x-ray. There were so many accidents, particularly from the mines. When they would come in most of them were paralyzed. We prayed and prayed, we made novena after novena for this one man, and every day we would go in and move his toes because from his waist down, he was paralyzed. That man walked out on crutches. We always felt that it was a miracle. What would happen is that they would be bent over and the coal would hit them on their backs and necks. Most of them were paralyzed and most of them died. We had good doctors, maybe 8 or 10 on the staff. One night, it wasn’t late, Sister Agnes Patricia and I were over by the main stairs and this man opened the door. He was drunk as a lord and he had this dagger of a knife in his hand and he came toward us. Agnes was a big woman and she was strong. She took her fist and got him up underneath the chin and he fell to the floor. I thought he was dead. We had a Jesuit priest who had been Master of Novices in St.Louis and was retired. He wasn’t too well. So, I went down to get him. I asked him to come quick, that I thought this man was dead. He came down and we found that the man wasn’t dead at all, he was just relaxed. �15 One evening I was going over to supper and I heard all this commotion outside. We didn’t have a paved street in front of the hospital, we just had gravel. This car passed and they threw out this person out into the gravel and went on. I called down the hall to bring a cart and I asked for some help. We went down with the cart and we carried that guy, he was only a young fellow about 19 years old. He had been in this bar and a bullet that was not meant for him had hit him. We took him back to the operating room. His mother came and he died within an hour. That was in the 30’s but it was still like Billy the Kid days. These were such good, simple people. They were good because they were in this little town and they had just coal mining. There was an international community there. They were some from the Far East there, we had all kinds of people. HOW COME THERE WAS SUCH A DIVERSITY THERE? I don’t know. Then we had little Saint Mary’s chapel where they practiced the Eastern Rite. The priest there was so good. He just walked the streets all the time and was so good to people and helped people on the way. Whenever the Bishop would come down, we always invited this priest up to the hospital to share with the other priests. He was such a good man. When I think about all this diversion stuff, that if you don’t do this you don’t belong to Rome, I can’t figure out all that stuff. The people were simple and good and they showered us with good home-made wine, with all kinds of food that they would bring in. It was just like a big family. There was Frankie Mayo {[not sure of this name} who was going with this girl. While they were courting each other, Frank would drive the truck up into the mountains to get trees about the 1st of December and “kinnikenic??” that would grow on the ground. It had red berries on it. We went up in a car while Frank took the truck. We had these great big thermoses of chili so we could have something to eat on the way. We would put the trees in the truck. We often had about 100 trees. We would chop down our own trees and yelled “lumber” when they were falling and then slide on down. Then we sat down and ate this chili and rolls. We also took thermoses of water to drink. We would get 10 or 12 bags of this “Kinnikenic” and we would start making wreathes down in the basement of the hospital. All the Sisters would come and Frankie Mayo and Kathy would come. They weren’t married yet. Every door in that hospital had a wreathe on it. �16 Sister Corolla, she came from {Kings???} I don’t know what nationality she was. She had charge of the chapel. She would simply bank the trees behind the altar and all around. Our chapel always looked beautiful Father Bob Derouen, a Jesuit, was born and raised in Trinidad. As a young kid, heused to come up and serve Father Garcia’s Mass. When we get together with Father Derouen we always had a lot of fun because we knew him as a kid. One time I wanted to get some red peonies for the feast of the Sacred Heart. And so, a couple of ladies who were good friends of ours suggested that we go to the cemetery. So we went down to the cemetery and we took one or two off of each grave and we had lovely peonies for the altar for the Lord. END OF TAPE #1 TAPE #2 When I was in Albuquerque, I always thought that it was nice to do things together, so we would put on a Christmas Play. All the nuns would come and they would just love this. It was good for the kids and they still talk about this when I go down there to Albuquerque. I think if I hadn’t entered I would probably go into dramatics because when I was in the Academy we had a lady who taught dramatics, Miss Cook, I often wonder what happened to her. Once, for our class play, she selected Pharaoh’s Daughter {see reference on page 5} While in Albuquerque, I had a bad asthmatic girl who came from Peoria, Illinois who came to work with me in this school and become a medical technologist. She finished and then married a pathologist from Lovelace Clinic. { here there is an aside about the Doctors who formed Lovelace Clinic especially a Doctor McKinnon.} Together, we had a nice relationship and we had a lot of fun together. But, they were real gentlemen. �17 Even today there were a number of people (maybe about 10) who worked with me in the schools and some of the regular students are still in Albuquerque. Some of them are just now retiring. There was one student in particular, Frances Harlan who came there. When she came to register, she was so much older than I was, I thought she was old enough to be my mother. She had been in the service and all and so I thought about taking her or not. So I did, and Frances Harlan always kept up with me. She would send me a little bit of money now and then. And then, the last five or six years she used to send me a check. She would want to know how much the plane fare would be so she would send me a check and I would go down there and stay a couple of weeks. She would get the others all together and we would go out to lunch together. This went on for the last five or six years, I guess. She passed away August of last year, but I got to see her last year. I went down and I went out twice to see her. She was 90 years old last July. One day I did ask her why she had always kept up with me. And she said that I had changed her life. She had never married. After she died she was cremated and her ashes were sent to Flint, Michigan where she was from. She had become a very dear friend. Once I noticed that she never went to receive Holy Communion and I asked her about, and she said: “Well, Sister, I don’t want to be a hypocrite, I just can’t go along with all the Holy Father does” I told her that I thought that all of us have something that we don’t agree with. But Jesus wants us to come to him. HOW MANY STUDENTS DID YOU HAVE FOR EACH SCHOOL? I would only accept 2 or 3 students in X-ray school each year and the same with the lab because in the lab we had pretty close quarters there so I only took about 3 or 4. There were a number of them from the University of Kansas. One of the students was Marguerite Block. I haven’t been able to find her again. Some of these people that I thought a lot of, I would always try to trace them down. In 1954 I was missioned to Kenton of all places. I went there on a train and I told the Conductor that he would have to call that place out when we get there because I have no idea where I am going. Sister Theodore was Superior/Administrator there and she met me at the train. It was a 75 bed hospital, and we had mostly injuries from the road and also from agricultural accidents. I had the lab, x-ray and blood bank there. I found it hard to get acclimated to that little place, because I was used to everything going so fast. �18 Sister Agnes Patricia had the Operating Room, Sister Gertrudis was there at the time. There was a nice little chapel. The people were just lovely, just humble people and good people. It was not a Catholic place. However, we did have across the street the Immaculate Conception parish, and our Sisters were there. Formerly, they had their own convent, but now they lived with us at the hospital. Sister Francis Solano was the Principal of the school; Ruth Beris (John Claire) came there out of the Novitiate; Patrice Vales came. I always said that I helped raise John and Patrice. HOW MANY SISTERS WORKED IN THE HOSPITAL? About 6, I guess, we had two floors and we had a pharmacy, the operating room, and the lab and x-ray. It couldn’t have been more than 6 Sisters. Sister Mary Lambert had the kitchen. Every year they had this big fiesta thing in August. After each one of them, Mary Lambert would start to prepare her noodles and freeze them. The big dish there was chicken and noodles. And we had this “fiesta”, you wouldn’t believe... the line to get this food was four blocks long. When I first got there I asked what Sister Theodore wanted me to do... and she said to just keep the line moving. There were tables out there where they ate. You wouldn’t believe the number of people that came to this big fundraiser for the hospital. Sister Mary Stephanie made so many things for that and she always came there to work in the summer-time preparing for this. She was the light of life there. Every other word you had to laugh at her. She was a wonderful person she certainly knew how to live life. I was there only one year. One day we all went to the Community Room for the opening of the mission letter. Agnes Patricia’s name was called out first, and then she called mine. I was dumbstruck, I had only been there for one year. Agnes was going to Albuquerque, and I was going to Corwin where we had just gotten there. Celestia went there the same year that I did, in 1955, and we had 12 Sisters there. Sister Helen Eugene was the Superior, Mary Joachim was there. You never saw such a lab (this was at the old Corwin). That was an experience that can never be taken away, it was a hard experience. Later, Sister Grace Marie was sent there. I was there 3 ½ years. At one time you had a 200 bed hospital, and then overnight (it seems) you had a 400 bed hospital. We didn’t know our way around the place. It was a very good learning experience this transition. It was for me and I know it was for the others. �19 I believe in life that each experience that you have today prepares you for tomorrow. We brought all these different groups of people to show them around. Grace Marie was just a devil, but I liked her, you couldn’t help but like Grace Marie. Nobody in the Community could have made that transition like she she did. The problem of making the two staffs of St. Mary and what was Corwin blend, they were at swords point all the time. I guess that part of it was competition. Grace Marie had a wonderful personality and one that drew people. In those days you still had to go down to her office to ask for some toothpaste. I thought that was the craziest thing. They hadn’t started putting stuff out in the cupboard yet. She was good to the nuns. Whenever she could she always had a big party for the Sisters. {an aside} every once in a while I would find a bottle of beer on my bed at night. Course, she knew we were both German. She was very personable. The convent was a residence facing Lake Avenue. We had a nice group of Sisters there. More came every year. We had the Community Room in the basement. There was a Sister named Sister Mary Lawrence , she later left the Community. She was from Nebraska. She had the x-ray department in St. Mary’s, then came over to Corwin and she had the x-ray department there. She was a very nice person. I really would like to get in touch with her. I had the lab, a very big lab, and also I had the morgue on my floor. There was one time, that I just couldn’t go in there, the person had been decapitated, and I felt that I didn’t need to see that. We had a pathologist there and I could get along with him pretty well. Later they brought another pathologist in. He was Jewish and he brought his own supervisor of the lab and so I thought I would not be there. After 3 ½ years I was missioned. But before that time, though, one Christmas, I was on this committee for fixing the Community Room. Sister Mary Lawrence was on the committee too, and she was very artistic. Sister Mary Joachim was on it, and myself. We thought we would use the theme “O Little Town of Bethlehem”. So, we got these past-board boxes and S. Mary Lawrence cut them out as houses and she made them so that the top could come off, we covered them with contact paper. We had all these houses different. So, we had at one end, the little town of Bethlehem. All our little presents, like towels and other things that we used to get went inside of the houses and we had each Sister’s name on the door of the house. �20 Sister Mary Joachim was very good at things like this, she covered the walls. We had a thousand stars hanging from the ceiling... we cut out a thousand stars.... Along the three walls we hung brown paper and Joachim painted palm trees on this paper. After we got all finished we had a three dimensional thing. Then we got little animals, we had a light behind red paper so it would look like a fire, then we had a little water for the animals. Before the Sisters came in, we dropped some dry ice in there so that the thing would bubble up. In those days, you first went to get the Superior when it was all ready. She just couldn’t get over how this was. We used to take great pride in fixing our Community Room. So, I suggested that the Sisters sing “O Little Town of Bethlehem” as they came in.... there were about 20 Sisters there at that time... This whole thing is something that I will never forget. Then, I was sent back to Trinidad. Gertrude Ann took my place in Pueblo. I had lasted 3 ½ years, but she lasted on 6 months. She and I get together once in a while and talk about that. She said she didn’t know how I stood it for 3 ½ years. In Trinidad they were having difficulty, but I just went back to my old place, which I just loved. I was there from 1958 to 1964. That was the time that Margaret Lois had been with the Benedictine Sisters and her time was up with them. She was a person whom, I think, was very misunderstood. She was sent home at that time {at this point the chronology gets a little confusing} {she speaks of S. Margaret Lois...???Sister Carol Marie Boggs???} At that time, too, Sister Agnes Patricia was there, Sister Jeanne Roach, S. Lucia Mao, S. Bernard Marie was the Administrator. S. Cornelius had been Administrator for a little while, then Bernard Marie (she was wonderful). A few thoughts here about Sister Remy (not sure of this name) who was very sick there she would never let herself be at ease. All these changes in the habit bothered her because she had such a long neck. When we took away the guimpe and had just a little collar, she just had a fit because her long neck showed. I’m glad that she wasn’t around when we did the rest of it because the changes were just terrible for her. We never had any money, so what was in the pancakes on Shrove Tuesday we (Sister Jeanne Roach and I) would keep and we would save it till summer time when it would be so hot. There was a coke machine in the back by the emergency room and we would just love to go get a coke and sit there and just love it. �21 I remember that is where I was when President Kennedy was killed. I also remember that that was when I volunteered for Peru. But, I wasn’t chosen and I was so disappointed. I just couldn’t understand what criteria they used to choose people. When Sister Rose Adelaide’s name came out I was very surprised. She was a perfectionist and I didn’t think that we would send anybody to South America who is a perfectionist. Amadea was also in Trinidad at that time. She had the pharmacy. In 1963 I had a slipped disc in my back. I went to Albuquerque for that surgery and I was there about 3 months. I had somebody in the lab while I was away. Carmella Riggio, sister of our Sister Rosalie Riggio was there for a long time. When I came back from my surgery, S.Mary Clare was there as Superior. She told me that Mother Mary Omer was in Santa Fe and she wanted to talk to me. Mother Mary Omer told me that Sister Margaret Lois was now in charge of the lab in Trinidad and I was to do just what she wanted me to do. I never had any trouble with Margaret Lois, she and I got along. Then I knew that I would be missioned in August. I was missioned to Dayton. To send a person who just had a back operation to Dayton, to the x-ray department and then to tell you not to lift. Well, there was no one around to do the lifting. We had 150 people a day and we had 3 machines to do this in. I was sent there to upgrade the x-ray school. It was in very poor condition when I went there. Sister Regina Marie had been there and she still was there when I arrived. I’m telling you, to try to get the school together and the department was no fun. The radiologists didn’t appreciate me, because I had all this experience and they didn’t want anybody to interfere with them. What they wanted was to lease these departments (lab and x-ray). So anyhow, I was there 6 years and I got the school running . There was a girl there who helped me, Jeannie Littleton, she was a technologist there. I just contacted her in Dayton lately and she is coming down here to see me. I haven’t seen her for over 20 years. I was in Dayton from 1964 to 1970 and I felt that I had been sent to do the school. At that time, Amadea invited me to go to Trinidad to take a government job with senior citizens. I said that I had no idea what to do with senior citizens. At that time, I was 58 and growing closer to being a senior citizen myself �22 Mr. Ford was the Administrator in Dayton. S. Anna had been put out to get a man in there. And they got this man, Mr. Ford. Anna was sent to Mt.Clemens. After Anna left, Sister Marie Therese was there. She was coordinator of the Sisters. Romana called me one day because Regina Marie had been missioned back here to the Mount, she had been in x-ray when I went there. Mother Romana just raked me over the coals and told me that I was not to say anything about Sister Regina, never to do that to a Sister, and I hadn’t. One day, the phone rang, and it was for me. It was Mr. Ford who said that he would like to see me in his office. So I went down. He said that he had had a call from someone this morning, no less than the Mother General. She wanted to know if the school would be hurt if I were sent to Trinidad. He also told me that I was not to discuss this with anybody and he wanted me back at 8:30 in the morning to give my decision. So I thought about it and I felt that this Doctor wants to get me out... but this is my hospital, and I’m not going to go until I’m ready. So I went down at 8:30 and I told him that “yes” I thought the school would be hurt if I left right now, because there is no one to take my place. END OF SIDE 1 OF TAPE #2 ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// SIDE 2 OF TAPE #2 Sister Agnes Patricia used to take care of the OB patients. One day I went up to get blood from somebody, a door opened as I was going down the hall, and this man walked out. He was stark naked except he had his hat on and a tie. He was suffering from the DT’s. I yelled for Leonella and she came and got him back in the room. .... all these funny things happened... One night I was up to do a blood count, x-ray or something and Agnes Patricia asked if I would mind helping her. She had a patient who was ready to deliver. So, I went up and I told her to tell me what to do. This woman kept saying “20...20...20” I asked what did she mean... I was told that this was her 20th child.... these stories always stuck in my mind. Sister Agnes Patricia was an excellent nurse and often had to deliver babies by herself, there were no doctors around. �23 Mother Regina made a visit one day and she was told by this Sister who was an anesthetist, that she had seen S. Agnes Patricia walking down the hall eating an apple. And, of course, she got crushed by Mother Regina... we weren’t allowed to let people know that ate. Some days we would go for 48 hours and not get any sleep. We were happy though, and everybody gelled into a real community. Those were happy days. I lived with S. Leonella while she was Superior there. She was an excellent nurse. One day, this accident was brought in, it was a whole wedding party. They were from Aguilar, a little town next to Trinidad, about 15 or 20 miles up the road, but they wanted to be married at Holy Trinity. Father Sebastiani was waiting for the wedding party down there and he called up to find out where they were. There were one or two killed in this accident. The bride just had a few scratches on her, I don’t remember about the groom, whether he lived or not. But that was a bad situation. One night three men were brought in, they were all Italian. They were shooting each other over a nickel. All three died that night. We called the priest. And while I had one on the operating table, I knew that there three bullets, but I could only find one hole. He had been shot right up the rectum. We had an awful lot of accidents. WERE YOU THERE WHEN THEY WERE HAVING SO MUCH TROUBLE WITH THAT ONE DOCTOR. I was there when he was in medical school... Dr. Donnelly, he worked with two other doctors, Doctor Newburn was one, he was a pathologist. Donnelly was a good guy. He was very good to people. I didn’t know him when all of that mess was going on. One day, after I had left Trinidad, I went back for a visit and I went to see him. You would have thought his mother had walked in. I had such a good relationship with him. I was there when he was married to a nurse who was from Denver. I liked her a lot. So, I knew him in a different light. Later we had two, father and son, Doctors Espys, who were both Doctors. They did not stay long, the father died and young Espy went up to Denver to work. �24 DID YOU HAVE A LOT OF NON-PAYING CASES THERE, THAT MADE IT HARD TO SUPPORT THE HOSPITAL? I didn’t know much about the financial affairs. When I was down in South Texas, a busload of us went up to Austin to the Capital and we asked for a package for the indigent people who were in health care. Four or five buses went up that time... and we got it. But, to know more about the business office in Trinidad, you would have to speak to Sister Mary Frances Dempsey who worked in that office at one time. In 1940, I was missioned to Albuquerque and I felt like I was going to the guillotine because I had heard so many things about these pathologists and radiologists and I had both lab and x-ray there. When I got there, there was a fracture room that I had to take care of. I was there from 1940 to 1954, so I was there through World War II. Talk about getting from the flame to the fire. We had the only emergency room open 24 hours a day. So many accidents happened on Highway 66 that goes east and west. I often asked why we had not built the hospital out there on this highway to save time. The pathologists and radiologists were Canadian and we always were short of help. It seemed that we always had money for something, but we never seemed to have money to get help. I took most of the night calls. My mother came out to see me in 1941. She hadn’t been feeling well. My cousins brought her out and they went on to California. I met her in Albuquerque and she was there about three weeks with me. One Saturday morning, she had a coronary and stroke at the same time, and she died a week after that. That was the way she wanted it, she wanted to be with me. The Sisters and everybody were wonderful to me. When your mother dies, it’s part of you that goes. I had been supposed to make the Albuquerque retreat and she died on the 25th of July and we came back on the train because we weren’t flying in those days. It took us two days and a night to bring the body home. Sister Margaret Jane was Superior and she came with me. The funeral was on the 30th. I had to get back down to Albuquerque, but I had a whole house to clear out. Dad was no help to me, Charlie was no help to me. Sister Helen Agnes went down with me. Mother Regina told me that I could go to my mother’s funeral...but I never thought that �25 I wasn’t going to my mother’s funeral. I had to be back down in Albuquerque for the 6th of August. I just didn’t know what to do with Mom’s stuff, she had so many wonderful things. I just didn’t have anybody to talk to. I had been in the Community 10 years, yet, I just didn’t feel that I could talk to anybody about it. But I did pack her dishes and I brought them up here. And, I was told to put them outside of that auditorium down there, and I’ve never seen them since. They were antiques and I wanted to go up to what used to be the library, where the stairs going up to the third floor, to see if they are there. But I never did. For the rest, I just called the St. Vincent de Paul and they took all into their store in Cincinnati. I felt that that was the only thing I could do. My mother is buried in the cemetery in Cleves where Dad is buried there, and grandma and grandpa are buried there. Mom’s two brothers were buried there. Sister Maria Fidelis took me there not too long ago. While I was at St. Joe’s in Albuquerque, a Father Fitzgerald, a Holy Ghost Father, got permission from Rome to establish this place for priests who drank and who had other problems... Villa Coeli. He also organized a Community while I was in New Mexico. He was a diabetic so he would come in to the hospital and he wouldn’t let anybody touch him except myself to draw blood. He had very small veins. He thought when he was establishing this, that he could do it all spiritually with not anything medical, but he found out that he couldn’t do this. A Doctor Roe went up there to help him. The idea was that they were going to have a clinic. They were going to take care of the medical part of the priests’ problems. But that didn’t work out. They really needed a doctor and sometimes a hospital. I just can’t imagine what is in the news today saying that this a place for bad priests. They are not bad priests, they are human priests. Many of them have been rehabilitated. The Community of Sisters who were there helping, didn’t have anything to eat. Some of them were nurses. So, to help out, we employed them so that they could have something to eat. They were considered part of St. Joe’s staff while they were waiting for the clinic to be finished. When these Sisters first started, they didn’t have a habit or anything, they would come in as nurses and work just like any other nurse would and be paid like anybody else would. They had to have some money coming in some place. One of the Sisters is named after me, Miriam Charles. She was in charge of the clinic in Santa Fe for a while. When they first came, only about three or four, they went to a Benedictine Convent to make their Novitiate. Now, they wear a wine colored habit and a white veil. Mother Bernadette, was made their Mother General, went through Seton School of Nursing in Colorado Springs. Later she got cancer, she died She died at St. Joe’s �26 Before she died, I wrote her a letter. And I still have the letter she wrote to me. I might give it to them someday. Mother Mary Joseph is presently Mother General. In the early 50’s I started a school of medical technology, and x-ray technology there. They were the first of those schools in the state of New Mexico. I have the original papers and other newspaper clippings. I’ll give them to the Archives. We also had the first blood bank in the state of New Mexico. The military came in trucks and busses and I would take their blood. The only way that you could keep a blood bank full was to put it on the radio. And sometimes the line was from the second floor down to the first floor of the old St. Joe’s hospital. Sometimes I’d be taking blood until 2:00 o’clock in the morning. But, we had to do that in order to keep the bank supplied. Some of the little hospitals in some of the little towns in New Mexico would call me, and I would call the police and I would send them the blood. Then there was a plane, it was called Citizens of Something that some times took blood to these small places. I started the first school of Medical Technologists in the state of New Mexico and the first organization of x-ray technology. These were state organizations. After I had been in the Community 16 years, I was allowed to go to the American Society of Medical Technologists Convention and X-ray Technologists Convention, too. What I learned there I would bring back and start it right away. Like, we went from rabbits in the pregnancy tests to frogs which you could find out about the pregnancy within a half hour. Now, they have all these different kinds of tests. In 1939 I came back here (Cincinnati) and I took Genetics courses and I went back to Trinidad. Somebody gave me a crookedneck white rabbit and a mate to go with it (the other one wasn’t crookedneck) so I wanted to know how many of their offrspring would be crookednecks because it was a deformity. I used to raise these rabbits, and they would come fast. The men in Trinidad would make me these boxes to keep these rabbits in. Father Ryan, who was a Jesuit, came out from the New York province because he wasn’t too well, and they gave him the job to help the poor. So, I would give him all these rabbits to give out for meat, because rabbit is good. �27 We always had an annual State Fair and I used to always have a booth, whether it was to advertise my school, or whether the students would go out and type blood for nothing, giving people a little card saying what their blood type was. One day, I walked around to see other booths and in one of them this man had ducks. You had to throw nickels on saucers and if you got a nickel on a saucer, you got a duck. Deep down in my heart I didn’t think that I should throw those nickels on that saucer because I didn’t think it looked too religious. So I stood there and just watched. Then, this man came over to me and asked me if I would like a duck and I said that I would love one. So, I took this duck home. This was in Albuquerque. I took this duck to the lab and I put it in a box. Later I got a galvanized tub and the men made me a screen to put over it so that the duck couldn’t get out. This little duck made a lot of noise. One student suggested that if we had another duck, that one duck wouldn’t make so much noise. She offered to go to the fair and bring me another duck, so she brought me another duck. They didn’t make any noise but they grew, and they grew, and they grew, so I couldn’t keep them in the lab anymore so I took them outside, but I had a problem of keeping them together. So, I thought I would take them up on the roof of the hospital. The roof of the hospital was gravel and tar. So they grew and they grew and they grew. None of them ever flew off, though. Whenever people would come to work at seven o’clock in the morning, you could hear these ducks...they made so much noise even though there were just two. Sister Mary Jude was Superior at this time. I got a telephone call one day and it was her asking me to come to her office right now. When I got down there, she asked me if I had ducks on the roof, and I admitted that I had. She told me that I had to get rid of them. So I suggested that I could have a duck dinner for the Sisters. She agreed. I asked for some money, because, we had 25 Sisters and I didn’t think two ducks would go around. So she said I could have the money. Agnes Patricia and I went down town and got more duck. So I knew that we couldn’t bother the big kitchen so we had our big dinner at Regina Hall. I got a duck stamp to stamp each napkin, and I got duck planters as prizes, and I had a duck movie and I asked the Doctors to give me their decoys. I took the silver paper that we get in x-ray and I had these decoys going from the door into the dining room. The nuns had so much fun when we had this meal on January 6. So year after year on January 6 we had a duck dinner as long as I was there. Everything was just ducky. �28 One day, I was called to x-ray a dead body that had just been dug up for a murder investigation. This body, a young man, had been buried for three weeks, and the odor was terrible, they took a sheet and dipped in formaldehyde and threw it over the body. I had to be in there because it was my department but the doctors did the preparation, and I took the picture and we saw where the bullet was. This was another thing which I never forgot. We had to do all sorts of things, whether we knew how to do them or not. For instance some of the times the doctors would have to give some anesthetic and they would have us “drop that ether”. I had never dropped ether before and I told the doctor that I didn’t know anything about this and I didn’t want to kill this person. But we were told to drop just a bit for the person to go out so that they could fix a bone. After my mother died, I knelt by my bed one night and prayed: “Mom, I don’t think that I can do this much longer”. I was called maybe four or five times a night all the time. Then I would work all day. The following August, I was missioned to St. Mary’s, Pueblo. But, the doctors, when they heard I was going, they all went to the Superior and told her that I couldn’t go because I did an enormous amount of work there. Four or five days after that I was told to stay. I stayed until 1954. Somebody told me that Sister Eugene Marie had said that I was the best technologist in the Community. Once, a group of us, S. Eugene Marie, Regina Marie, Carol Marie, Jean Hickey, and myself went a whole month to meet with these nationally known men who had done work with the RH factor. We went to Buffalo, New York City, New Jersey, there were five places that we went to as a group. We stayed about a week at each place. They were just wonderful to us. It was good to learn about how they came to find this and all about it. It meant a lot to us. END OF SIDE2 OF TAPE #2 �29 BEGINNING OF TAPE #3 I got a call from S. Amadea who said she needed me to come back to Trinidad. The government wanted to hire somebody for Senior Citizens. I said that I didn’t think I knew anything about Senior Citizens, but she assured me that I could do it. (May 1970)—So, I went to Trinidad . This was 150 miles that I had to serve in all these little towns. So, I thought, I’ll take a town one by one. So I went to Walsenburg which was the biggest place. I got in touch with the person who was working for the government in that area and asked that person to call a meeting of Senior Citizens to see if anybody was interested in things to be done for senior citizens. I think there were 12 people who came to the meeting. I asked them what they needed here. They said that they needed a place to come and socialize and play bingo or play cards or whatever. So, we decided that group of women would do the cooking for the dinner and that we begin by charging only fifty cents and then have bingo. I remember that we had 50 people there. I brought the prizes, like practical stuff like paper towels, sugar, flour, things that they could use in their homes. They had a wonderful time. We had a meeting after the bingo to see if there was anything that the people wanted to say. So, we started once a week. Every Tuesday we had this social time, and they just loved it. So, then, I took on Aguilar which was maybe 15 or 20 miles away from Walsenburg, so that was smaller. I called this meeting and I think I had 2 or 3 people who came. We talked and they thought that they wanted that same thing. So, we got that started. We did that on another day. I went to all these things now. Some of them had to be in the evening. Then I branched up 28 miles up into Gardener. This was in the mountains west of Walsenburg. Gardener was almost a skeleton city at this time. There were a lot of elderly people there. They even had a little church there and they had a priest who would stay there. I went there and asked them what they needed. They said that they needed a grocery store because one went bankrupt and the other one was burned down. There was a skeleton building there that had never been finished. So, because I worked for the government, I could go to Pueblo and get all of this stuff to finish this building for free. So, I would go up in a truck where I could get this stuff, and luckily four hippies came in to live there. They were nice fellows. I made a deal with them. I said that I would give them food if they would help me build this building. I would get all the stuff for them. �30 They would tell me what they needed. I would write this down and go off in my truck. I would bring a load down and the guys would work diligently, and I gave them food. So, this went on and the building was finished. I started a grocery store there. I used to go around to all the discount places, even if I could just get things down five cents for the poor people, they were satisfied with that. I stocked this store and I had to get somebody else to run it, because I was busy setting up all these other places. I got a respectful person, Josephine, who lived in Walsenburg to run it. She only lived about 28 miles away and she could do that. The store would be open just so many hours. WHERE DID YOU GET THE MERCHANDISE? DID YOU BRING IT IN? I did. And I only had a little Gremlin. When I started this, I called Assunta and I said that I needed a car. I didn’t drive at this time, so Frankie Mayo taught me to drive. When I went to this place to get this car, they had just got this lettuce green Gremlin with a white stripe around it. Of course, I didn’t know that this was a sports car, but it was a car. I learned to drive it, it was good on gas, it had a rack on top. I would get milk and bread, some meat, staple foods. Sometimes I would bring a cake or whatever. I would ask them what they needed. There were a number of these places in Trinidad, these discount places and I would buy this stuff with my money... the government’s money... and I would get whatever they needed. This went on as long as I was there, but nobody else would do this after I left. After that I went to Sopras toward the mountains near the Purgatory River. I went there and did the same thing. They wanted to socialize, so I set that up for them. Then I went East which was 75 miles from Trinidad. There were two towns to which I went there and set up this socializing thing. I went to everyone of these things, some of this had to be at night. Then there was another little town by the mountains which they call “the breasts” because there are two peaks there and there is a little town there, so I set things up there. DID YOU HAVE ANYTHING IN TRINIDAD ITSELF? Trinidad had its own. They were kind of “up-ish” people but I tried to work with them, and I became good friends of theirs. �31 So, after two years, I thought that we should have something big. So, I asked the Bishop of Pueblo if he would come down and have a Mass at the stadium. I had arranged buses to go to all of these places and bring these people in for the Mass. I had one person from every place to bring up an offertory procession what was indicative of their little place. Some of them brought up a piece of coal, whatever. I invited the Trinidad group to be the hospitality people. This was held in the stadium and it was full. The mariachi people did the music. It was a real Spanish celebration and it went over big. The presider was Bishop Buswell. The mariachis came down from Pueblo to do the music and everything went very well. This was the big culmination of setting up the whole project. The stadium was packed. At this point I thought that I was just babysitting here. The Executive Council wanted to know who was going to take my place. But I didn’t think that that was my responsibility. I then applied to go to South America BEFORE YOU START WITH SOUTH AMERICA, MAY I ASK YOU A COUPLE OF QUESTIONS? YOU WERE LIVING WITH S. AMADEA ALLTHIS TIME, COULD YOU SAY SOMETHING ABOUT HER? Well, she was more heart than prudence. For instance, if you ever rode in a car with Ami, you prayed like the dickens that she wouldn’t be hit. She would go like a snail. She would pick up every hitchhiker. I tried to warn her that all were not good. But just she just said that God would take care of her. Whenever she met a poor person on the street who asked her for some money, she would give them $50 or something. I told her that I thought the money ought to go where it would be used right. She said that he had promised to give it back to her. Of course I was sure that he wouldn’t give it back to her... and he didn’t give it back to her. But, Ami was so good, if she didn’t go to heaven in a hanging basket, I don’t have a chance. She contracted a circulatory disease that is hereditary. Her sister had it and died, her sister Dorothy had it and died after Ami did. Ami, in the cold weather her poor little hands would become all blue. She couldn’t really take care of herself. She and I lived together and Jean Therese lived there with us, Florence, Ami and myself. Towards the end she couldn’t even dress herself and Florence was so good to her. Still, she drove this car and I was scared to death that she would be killed in it. But, everybody knew Ami and they would just get out of our way when they saw her coming. She was one of the sweetest people. She was always affirmative with the people with whom she worked. And the people that she met and gave things to, she never thought bad of anybody. �32 One day I was looking for a place to set up a used clothing store. The place I found was on the main street of Trinidad. I went to the owner and asked him how much he wanted for rent and he said $150 a month. Well, I didn’t have a cent, but I said I would take it believing that God would come through. The senior citizens would make various things, I would take them in and give them the money back. People brought all kinds of nice things, shoes, dresses, etc. We got old mannequins from the stores etc. Nobody ever said no to us. It became a real nice store. I had to get somebody to help me run it, because I was doing so many things and out on the road. At the end of the first month, I asked the lady, Mrs. Ortega, how much money did we have. She said that we had $300 and therefore, I felt that we had enough to pay our rent. This project went on until I left Trinidad for good. Theophane took it over I think. A word about Theophane... she was just like Amadea... she would give money to anyone who asked for it. At one time, she didn’t have a job and she called me from Pueblo and asked me if she could help me in Trinidad. I invited her to come down and I knew that she could do something there. Betty Davis didn’t have anything to do either and I invited her down also. I gave them different places to go and take care of that would relieve me a bit. Sometimes I would be traveling at 12:30 at night coming home from those far eastern parishes. I never was afraid, I just locked the car door. HOW LONG WERE YOU THERE THAT TIME...IN TRINIDAD? Two years... in two years I set up seven centers, a used clothing store and a grocery store. By that time I was just babysitting. That is when I asked to go to South America in August of 1972. In June of 1972 I drove my car from Trinidad to the Motherhouse. I expected to go to Ecuador in September. But, we had our first Congress that year so I stayed for that. While I was in Cincinnati, I stayed at St. William’s and they gave me the goingaway service there. Father Bob Strassel was there and he had the service and all the missionaries who happened to be in Cincinnati at the time participated. After the Congress, I went down to New Orleans waiting for the ship to go out because I was booked to go on the GULF BANKER, which is a cargo ship (freighter). Sister Stephanie drove me from St. William’s with all this stuff that I was taking. I had sent down all the equipment and things from St. Williams to New Orleans on the Greyhound bus and they kept that there in their warehouse until I arrived and was ready to board ship �33 The day before I was to board I was called. I got a truck and two men and we went down to the warehouse where the men put everything into the truck and we took it down to where we were to board. I boarded the next day. We never have to pay anything if they don’t put it down in the hold of the ship. They had an extra cabin, and they filled my room from floor to ceiling. So none of it had to go in the hold. The ship only had room for 13 passengers. One particular couple had a gentleman who was ill with a terminal disease and she was taking him on this voyage clear around the western side of South America. She was so distraught with this, so she used to come in our cabin and cry. There is always two to a cabin and I had a nice young lady there. They give you the service on these freighters like you would have in a hotel. They change your bed every day, they would have fruit on a table in the center of the room. And every place that they stopped to leave cargo, we were given enough time to go to the surrounding places and visit. They would post eight hours before the ship would leave so we had plenty of time. When we got to Columbia, it was so hot there that I thought I would just collapse. So we went to a place to eat our meal where I had a real cold beer, and it never tasted better to me in my life than it was with that meal. We went to Calle which was two hours away in Columbia. We never knew where we were going to stop, so I feel like I have been in every port in Columbia. DID YOU GO THROUGH THE CANAL? We went through the Canal and that was another lovely experience. It takes 8 hours to go through, and we went through half by day and half by night (darkness). It is just marvelous to see how that water comes in from that lake and raises that heavy ship to the lock.... there’s three locks. There was one lane going south and another going north... we would wave to the people on the other ships going north as we were going south. We stopped at Cristobal where we could get all kinds of drinks that were tax free and every that one buys is tax free, so I got a beautiful tablecloth for one of my cousins, a linen tablecloth for nearly nothing. At one stop we went up and found a church and went to Mass there. For me it was the first time traveling that way and I was all eyes and ears. It was a beautiful experience. If anybody can get a freighter and go through the canal it is well worthwhile. �34 HOW LONG WAS THE VOYAGE FROM NEW ORLEANS TO WHERE YOU WERE GOING? Well, you could never have an appointment at the other end, because you have to stop at all these places where they have cargo; you have to go with the tides in the ports, some have strikes etc. Well, we were supposed to leave New Orleans and in 10 days we would be in Ecuador. But, I never had that happen to me. Once I was aboard ship for a whole month. The cost was very reasonable. I only paid about $375 to go down. The first time it took me about 17 or 18 days. I kept in touch with the place where I was going, so that the Sisters could meet me when I arrived. I was scheduled to go to El Puyo with Dominican nuns who had a clinic there. They were supposed to meet me. Well, I had all this stuff and had to be very careful to stay with all the boxes, I got off and then I followed the boxes The Sisters were waiting with a jeep there. HOW DID YOU FIND OUT ABOUT THIS PARTICULAR MISSION? I corresponded with different relief efforts, and this was a relief that was stationed in Santa Barbara. I even went to Santa Barbara to see these people. They place you but they don’t give you any money to carry on. They knew about this place that needed a medical technologist to start a laboratory. DID YOU SPECIFICALLY SAY THAT YOU WANTED TO BE IN A PLACE WHERE THERE WERE OTHER SISTERS? No, but as I was a Sister they kind of placed me there. These were not Ecuadorian Sisters, they were American... Dominican Sisters. Two of them were there, one was a nurse and the other taught school. The monastery of Dominicans that was in Guayaquil is the place where the ship took us. The priests had a monastery there and when the Sisters came down from the mountains, they would have a place to stay. We only stayed there overnight. The next day we hade a 10 hour ride in this jeep to where we were going, El Puyo. �35 DID YOU SPEAK SPANISH? Buenos dias, buenos tardes, buenos noches.... that’s all. I managed to get along very well. DID THE PEOPLE AT EL PUYO SPEAK SPANISH OR ENGLISH? They spoke Spanish and some Indian... it was the outer part of the jungle. It was way up in the mountains...beautiful. The river ran along at about a 15 ft drop and all along the river there was only room for one car, then they had places a few miles apart where you had to go to pass another car. I was so frightened, I couldn’t look down. I thought that if I ever got there I would not leave until I would be going home. At El Puyo there was a clinic and a little house that we lived in...all cement. We had individual rooms and we had a little chapel. I tried to set up a little laboratory where I could. The Indians would come in from the jungle to deliver their babies and they would come in for other things, too. So I would do the blood work for them or any other special tests. DID THEY HAVE EQUIPMENT THERE OR DID YOU BRING ALL THAT OUT? I brought it with me. I went there realizing that they were about 50 years behind us so I took the stuff down that I would need. So it worked out pretty well. I was there a whole year. In December I wrote to Stephanie in Peru that I would be coming over for Christmas because she was alone. She had a room in this school building which was cement and she probably did social service work with the poor. Before I left her on January 4, we had an earthquake. The other Sister had gone home to spend Christmas and so I had a room. I had a little aluminum bed. During the earthquake, the bed was going from wall to wall. We opened the door and stood in the doorway the best place to be during the earthquake. It lasted, it seemed like an hour, but it was only a few minutes. When it ended, we went back to bed. I stayed with her until after Christmas == AN ASIDE== Before I first went to Peru, on December 12, while the Dominican Sister and I were eating a little supper and there was a rap on the door and she went to the door and I heard Stephanie’s voice. She had come to get me. We left about 4 o’clock in the morning to take the bus to go to Guayaquil where we would take a plane to Peru.== �36 I met a younger priest who was a native Ecuadorian who asked me if I would go down to his clinic which was down close to the ocean. At that clinic we had 150 people a day. This was at (Milagro) where I was closer to Guayaquil, only 45 minutes away. There was another Dominican Sister, Sister Rosario who was a nurse who came there to work. Sister Jean Patrice came to visit us there. This priest, I thought at first when I first met him, that he was a very, very good guy. But, as time went on, the only time that he was there at his parish was on weekends when he said Mass. Otherwise, he went to the University of Guayaquil and he stayed there in the Dominican house. He was learning to be a lawyer. He had a terrible temper. One night, when Rosario had been cooking, we were at the table, and he said to her that she should really learn to speak Spanish and she answered him that at least she was speaking it and he was not speaking English. He slapped her and he left the table. From that time on I watched my p’s and q’s with him. We only stayed there a year. At every place that I went, it just killed me to see, every day, these little white coffins go through the streets. Children never had a chance from birth to 3 years old. Custom was very important to the people, and these children would not get any solid food until they were 3 years old. Their little bodies were not strong enough to even live. So, I would teach them in the laboratory that when they had potatoes to eat, mash some up and put a little green from the wheat and give them to the children. Also taught them how to mash a little bit of banana and let the children eat it. After 6 months they ought to have solid food in their stomach. It was just terrible to see all these little ones die from malnourishment. The mothers meant well, but this was what their mothers did and they thought that this was what they were supposed to do. That was a big thing for me. I had an awful time dealing with that. What is needed is to have somebody go down there and teach them. Then I was invited to Guayaquil. �37 This was a huge clinic on the side of the big church, named San Francisco. The Spanish Fathers had this and there was a Sister who was a Franciscan from Peoria, Illinois who was in charge of this clinic. So I went down there and asked her about setting up a little laboratory there and she was very nice to me. Sister Corita was her name. When I had been in Milagro, there was a young lady who had graduated from the University of Guayaquil in medical technology but had no place to practice her skills. She came from Milagro and worked with me for several months and she stayed on when I left. Guayaquil is the biggest city in Ecuador. While I was there I met a priest who was a member of the Fathers of St. James from Boston. These priests were in Ecuador, Peru and Columbia and other countries. This priest, Father John Moriarity was in a little town called Duran. His parish was named Santa Mary Anita. One day as he and I were talking I asked him if he would like a clinic in his parish, and he said yes. So, when I finished at San Francisco in Guayaquil, I went across the river to Duran and set up a clinic there. I suggested that Father talk to the doctors, but he insisted that I do it all. I had to prepare a list of what I had and gave that to a doctor in a notebook so he would know what we had at the clinic. The Doctor would write out a prescription and then the people would come to the clinic to fill the prescription. We used to have between 75 and 100 people a day. I couldn’t open the clinic until 2:00 o’clock in the afternoon because there were about 700 kids in the school and they were in the way. So, I waited until school was out to open the clinic. One day a month, Sister Corita would receive these huge boxes of used glasses from the Lions in Minneapolis and we would sort them out, men’s, women’s, children’s. And for a whole day, once a month we had “glass day”. At 7 o’clock in the morning they were lined up no less than a hundred. For only a few sucres they could get a pair of glasses. They would just try them on “trial and error” until something would help them. �38 Another thing that Father would do once or twice a year, he would line up these Boston doctors who could do facial or plastic surgery. You have no idea how many children had harelips in Ecuador. These doctors would come down and go to one of the hospitals and the would teach the Ecuadorian doctors how to perform these surgeries. These American doctors would stay 4 or 5 days to do this and are still doing this. I thought that was great. Father Moriarity had a big celebration for my Golden Jubilee in Ecuador and he also came here for my celebration. He had the Archbishop come to celebrate the jubilee Mass in Ecuador and there many people there to celebrate. The doctors from the United States were there and took some beautiful pictures. I have this picture that they took in the church for the celebration. Everybody and his brother came to this celebration. In 1980, I started thinking that it was time for me to go home, so I wrote to Barbara Padilla. She came down for 12 weeks and decided that that was what she wanted. So, she replaced me, but this past year they asked her not to come back, so she is working someplace else. In the Fall of 1980, Sister Margaret Ebbing, the Regional, asked me if I would go work with the East Coast Migrant Health Project. So I was signed to go to Immokalee, Florida to work with the migrants. In the summer time I went to Southern Jersey. I did that for 2 years. Down in Florida they were all illegals from Mexico and they didn’t want to be sent back so I would have to go out and get them and bring them to the clinic. It was like finding a needle in a haystack. They wouldn’t give their right name and so it was just terrible just trying to find them. In Jersey was just the opposite. There it was wonderful, the land owners had nice places for them to live. We were told that we were there to change their life... and we tried. We were getting federal money for these clinic. But, in Florida, the people lived in rough sewage. They had mattresses to lay on in cars or on the ground and those things were filthy. �39 I had met a young guy in another town and I asked him if he would come with me and write this up and publish it. I told him that I would take him to three places. At about this time, the first 1500 Haitians came over. These Haitians spoke Creole and were from a very refined culture. I often asked myself why the state didn’t do something about this. Why couldn’t Public Health go around and see this. The young man wrote this up and published this in this paper. Then, Public Health said why didn’t I go over to them with the complaint. But I was thinking they should be out there looking for these things. I got a slap on the wrist from Margaret Ebbing. But, I thought to myself that they wanted us to change the life of these people and we worked at it. I began to wonder why I was using my energy on this, but I stayed on for 2 years, then I resigned. As to Jersey, I loved it. There was a wonderful group of people to work with it was great. I still go up there and visit with them. I had to drive 1200 miles every six months from Florida to Jersey. It took me two days and a half to drive up. I’d just get on Route 95 and then down to 75. I never was afraid. Another reason was that we had a fuzzy dog and I used to sit it up on a box in the car and from the back, people would think that I had a dog, but, of course, if they came around the side, they would know that it was fake. When I was in Jersey I stayed with the Sisters of St. Joseph of Mercy. After I resigned from the work in Florida and Jersey... in 1982... I felt called to refugees. A little inner voice told me that the refugees would be next in my life. I spoke to Helen Flaherty and told her that I felt called to go down and work with the refugees in South Texas. I didn’t know what I would be doing, but I wanted to go down to see what I could do. I told her that if I found a niche I wouldn’t come back, and if I didn’t find a place I would come back. Her answer was: “God speed, Charles” Sister Alma had a week off over at the College, so she drove down with me. When I got down there I saw all of these people coming over the boarder with only the clothes on their back. �40 To feed them became my great concern. I asked myself where we would get the food to feed these people. So I decided to go around to see what I could do. I went to the dairy (Hygea Dairy), I met with the head honcho, I told him who I was and what I wanted to do, and would he help me. He said that he could give me so much ice cream every week, he could give me a lot of cottage cheese and some drinks, like orange juice. I told him thanks and that I would be back on whatever days he wanted me to come to collect this. He told me Tuesday and Thursday. That was the first place I had gone and I got into a loving relationship with the dairy from the President on down. I ended having so much food that sometimes I would have to make two or three trips.... just from the dairy! All of this took place in Harlingen, Texas. From then on, I went down to where the trucks brought in all these vegetables from the farms... a processing place. The first guy I met, I introduced myself. He told me that he was a good Baptist, but he had a guy in there that was supposed to be a good Catholic so he told me to go in and talk to him. So I went in and talked to him about what I wanted to do. He told me that he could give me “seconds”. I asked him what were “seconds”... he said, like a carrot, if its not straight it can’t be sold, sometimes potatoes, sometimes other vegetables. So I asked him what day he would want me to come down.... ABRUPT END TO TAPE #3 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Metz, Sister Judith, SC Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Strassel, Charles Miriam, SC Location The location of the interview Cincinnati (Ohio); Trinidad (Colo.) Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data Audio/cassette Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 4 Hours 31 Minutes 45 Seconds Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sister Charles Miriam Strassel, SC Interviewed by Sister Judith Metz, SC March 16, 1993 Subject The topic of the resource Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati; Monasticism and religious orders for women -- Catholic Church -- History; Catholic hospitals -- History Description An account of the resource An interview with Sister Charles Miriam Strassel by Sister Judith Metz. This recording is a part of the oral history series housed at the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati Archives. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Strassel, Charles Miriam, SC; Metz, Sister Judith, SC Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati Archives Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 03/16/1993 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Online access is provided for research purposes only. For rights, reproduction, and use requests or more information, please contact the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati Archivist Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource "Audio/mp3 Audio/cassette Application/pdf" Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Oral History Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Sister Charles Miriam Strassel, SC Interviewed by Sister Judith Metz, SC March 16, 1993 Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1912-1993 Healthcare Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/ad8f06015b467be463a9885813c1dfdd.jpg a735053e8606c2a7c064fd9468d2f3ee Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sisters of Charity of New York Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview Bullock, Angelica Interviewee The person(s) being interviewed Sugrue, Noreen, SC Location The location of the interview The New Jewish Home, Kittay Senior Apartments, Bronx, New York Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data audio/mp3 Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 28:52:00 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Sugrue, Sister Noreen, SC Oral History Subject The topic of the resource Sugrue, Sister Noreen, SC Description An account of the resource Sr. Noreen Sugrue has shared her reative skills as a teacher, artist and Congregation archivist. She taught elementary grades, spirituality to novices, and art to students of all ages, including one summer in Appalachia and ten summers at the New York Foundling. From 1973-1986 as the Assistant Archivist for the Congregation, she chose a new archives storage location and designed the building space, managed the artifacts in the Elizabeth Seton Museum, and arranged and described the historic materials. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sugrue, Noreen, SC Bullock, Angelica Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Sisters of Charity of New York Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-05-06 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Mindy Gordon (Transcriber, Editor) Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Permission for reproduction or quotation must be obtained through written application to: Director of Archives, Sisters of Charity of New York, 6301 Riverdale Avenue, Bronx, New York, 10471. This permission is valid only insofar as the Archives of the Sisters of Charity of New York, as owner or custodian, has any rights in the matter and does not remove the responsibility of the author, editor, and publisher to guard against the infringement of any rights; including copyright, that may be held by others. Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource audio/wav application/pdf Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Oral History Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Sugrue, Noreen, SC Oral History Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant New York City https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/24b22cb8bc93057d9a2dbc01c6c428aa.jpg 0c4122c09ab1674e76d2d453bb3e26b1 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Poor Box from St. Patrick’s Asylum, Manhattan Subject The topic of the resource Poor boxes Charity Orphanages St. Patrick’s Orphan Asylum (New York, N.Y.) Description An account of the resource The first New York mission of the Sisters of St. Joseph in New York, the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum, was incorporated in 1817. Known as St. Patrick’s Asylum due to proximity to St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral, the orphanage was quickly filled, to capacity. To raise funds for a new building, a poor box was placed in St. Patrick’s Orphan Asylum by Sr. Elizabeth Boyle, who became the first Mother Superior of the Sisters of Charity of New York in 1846. The donations placed in the poor box were a source of support for many. The word, ‘Charity’ in gold, capital letters is painted on the front of box; a wood cross is positioned on top of the box. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Sisters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul of New York Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource ca. 1820 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Permission for reproduction or quotation must be obtained through written application to: Director of Archives, Sisters of Charity of New York, 6301 Riverdale Avenue, Bronx, New York, 10471. This permission is valid only insofar as he Archives of the Sisters of Charity of New York, as owner or custodian, has any rights in the matter and does not remove the responsibility of the author, editor, and publisher to guard against the infringement of any rights; including copyright, that may be held by others. Relation A related resource N/A Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Wood, with painted gold lettering Stand: 48” tall Charity box: 8” (tall) x 4” (width) x 2” (depth) Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical Object Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N/A Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant ca. 1822-1862 Sisters of Charity of New York https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/e08744bc1ee837c449b2c3aae126d332.jpg 5106cc751a0095b657598dc76b01f58e Physical Object An inanimate, three-dimensional object or substance. Note that digital representations of, or surrogates for, these objects should use Moving Image, Still Image, Text or one of the other types. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Embroidery on silk of pandas Subject The topic of the resource Catholic Sisters Religious women Missionary activity Orphans Embroidery Chinese artwork Hunan, China Missioners Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth Convent Station, NJ Description An account of the resource In October 1996 Sister Mary Carita Pendergast, a Sister of Charity of Saint Elizabeth, received this piece of embroidery, framed in glass, from Agnes Chao, a Chinese woman living in Shanghai at the time. Sister Carita had been a missioner in Hunan Province, China from 1933 to 1951. The Sisters of Charity raised the orphaned Agnes from infancy and educated her to the level of a normal school (teacher education) graduate. Agnes then taught in the Sisters’ school in Wuki. When the Communist government interrogated Sister Carita prior to her expulsion from China in 1951, they turned to Agnes and demanded that she testify to the Sisters’ crimes, which she refused to do even with a gun pointed at her. In 1996 Agnes Chao was a grandmother, working in a factory; the cost of shipping the package to Sister Carita – a token of Agnes’s gratitude and concern – might have been two months’ salary. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth, Convent Station, New Jersey Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Permission for reproduction or quotation must be obtained through written application to: Director of Archives, Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth, P.O. Box 476, Convent Station, New Jersey. This permission is valid only insofar as he Archives of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth, as owner or custodian, has any rights in the matter and does not remove the responsibility of the author, editor, and publisher to guard against the infringement of any rights; including copyright, that may be held by others. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource ca. 1995 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Embroidery (under glass) Language A language of the resource English Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Relation A related resource N/A Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical object Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N/A Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant N/A Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/31a11d352fbeec210a50abaeb1ee6380.jpg 849ef616b4a46cb7f72fd8d2cd1bfc02 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Statue of Madonna and Child Jesus Subject The topic of the resource Catholic Sisters Religious women Statue Madonna and Child Jesus Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth Convent Station, NJ Newark, NJ Madison, NJ Sisters of Charity of New York Description An account of the resource This statue of the Madonna and Child Jesus was given to Sister Mary Xavier Mehegan, a Sister of Charity of New York, circa 1859. The statue was given to her by the Sisters of Charity of New York when Sister Mary Xavier agreed to help found the Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth in New Jersey. Now Mother Mary Xavier, she kept the statue in the first Motherhouse in Newark, New Jersey and carried it in her arms on the carriage ride to rural Morris County on July 2, 1860 when the Motherhouse was relocated to Madison, New Jersey. It is on display in the Heritage Room of the Motherhouse. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource ca. 1859 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Permission for reproduction or quotation must be obtained through written application to: Director of Archives, Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth, P.O. Box 476, Convent Station, New Jersey. This permission is valid only insofar as he Archives of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth, as owner or custodian, has any rights in the matter and does not remove the responsibility of the author, editor, and publisher to guard against the infringement of any rights; including copyright, that may be held by others. Relation A related resource N/A Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Statue, plaster Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical object Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N/A Sisters of Charity of Saint Elizabeth https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/b4f7edf0d34b9b1e56cfbc1bc44b953c.jpg 68411b881f3dcc3560ffb157dce5909d Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Snowsuit from Roselia Boarding Baby Subject The topic of the resource Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill (Greensburg, Pa.) Sisters-Religious life Hospitals-Maternity services Orphans and orphan-asylums Social service-Religious aspects-Catholic Church Roselia Foundling and Maternity Hospital (Pittsburgh, Pa.) Maternity homes-Pennsylvania-Pittsburgh Pennsylvania-Pittsburgh Orphanages-Pennsylvania-Pittsburgh Children Adopted children Adoption Women Pregnant Women Description An account of the resource Description A baby left on a convent doorstep on March 17, 1884 initiated the journey for the Sisters of Charity in Pittsburgh to establish their first healthcare institution, a medical facility and boarding home for foundlings and unwed pregnant women. With the help of Roselia and Charles Donnelly and other benefactors, the sisters opened a small house in July 1891. By the end of the first month, the admission of nineteen infants stressed the limits of the building. The need for additional space prompted Mr. Donnelly to purchase the old Ursuline Academy in the Hill District. It became known as Roselia Foundling and Maternity Hospital. From 1891 until its closure in 1971, over 27,000 orphaned and temporarily boarded children came through Roselia. Nearly 50 years later, John Smith* contacted the Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill to learn more about Roselia and for clues into his beginnings. John’s connection to the Sisters of Charity, though brief, hints at the influence the Sisters of Charity can and have had on children. After his mother abandoned him at birth, infant John was sent to Roselia as a boarding baby in 1938. The Sisters of Charity in charge there lovingly cared for him for nine months. He was later formally adopted by his paternal grandparents. For 80 years, the outfit the Sisters delivered John home in was preserved in the family. The snowsuit includes the note: “Johnnie, You were so small your little feet were inside this little suit.” Thankful for the love and care of the sisters and for the opportunity to live a full and rich life, John donated this snowsuit to the archives of the Sisters of Charity, along with the story of his upbringing and family. It serves as a symbol of the warmth and love the Sisters have had for children, particularly foundlings, adopted children, and infants. The Sisters of Charity hold the records of Roselia and continue to field research requests related to birth parents and children. *Name anonymized to protect identity. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Source Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource ca. 1938 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Courtesy of the Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill Archives, Greensburg, Pennsylvania. Relation A related resource N/A Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Costume (mode of fashion) Clothing & dress Language A language of the resource N/A Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical object Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1938-2018 Roselia Foundling and Maternity Hospital (Pittsburgh, Pa.) Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/022581442207e88d86ddde786e4a51c8.JPG adcc02c527c03f6ee0afaf9b8c2f03d8 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Key to the St. Joseph Motherhouse (Stokes Mansion) at Seton Hill Subject The topic of the resource Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill (Greensburg, Pa.) Sisters-Religious life House key Engraving (metal-work) Description An account of the resource The original key to the front door of the Stokes Mansion which served as the first motherhouse and Academy of the Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill in Greensburg. Mother Aloysia Lowe, foundress of the Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill, used the key up until her death in 1889. The Sisters preserved the key as a treasured memento of the community’s early years in Greensburg. In 1932, in honor of the 50th Jubilee of the congregation, Father Daniel Sullivan, the first priest-president of Seton Hill College, commissioned a special engraved metal accompaniment for the key. It reads “With this key Mother Aloysia Lowe unlocked and entered this the first mother house of the Sisters of Charity Aug. 7 1882. Seton Hill.” On the reverse appears a quote attributed to Mother Aloysia which reads “I opened not merely the door of this house, I swung the gates of an era.” This attributed quote reflects the roles of Mother Aloysia as leader, foundress, and visionary. It serves as a reflection of the sisters’ astounding work over more than 150 years. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource c. 1882 (original key) c. 1932 (engraving) Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Courtesy of the Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill Archives, Greensburg, Pennsylvania Relation A related resource N/A Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Metal (unknown) Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical object Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N/A Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1882-1932 Sisters of Charity of Seton Hill https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/17385de3aa3a93ac1c2a56de413fc9ce.jpg 70621f746645a68e9661a41402d68bc0 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Rocking chair, kneeler and wheelchair used by Foundress, Mère Marie-Anne Description An account of the resource Rocking chair, kneeler and wheelchair, were used by Foundress, Mère Marie-Anne; she was 73 years old when she, with 52 sisters, founded Religieuses de Notre-Dame-Du_Sacre-Coeur (Our Lady of the Sacred Heart). This is the first wheelchair used in the Congregation. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Religieuses de Notre-Dame-Du_Sacre-Coeur (Our Lady of the Sacred Heart) Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Statue Plaster?? Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical Object Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1924 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Online access is provided for research purposes only. For rights, reproduction, and use requests or more information, please contact the Religieuses de Notre-Dame-du-Sacre-Coeur (Our Lady of the Sacred Heart) Subject The topic of the resource Wheelchairs Rocking chairs Kneelers Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N/A Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant N/A Les Religieuses de Notre-Dame-du-Sacré-Coeur https://www.scfederationarchives.org/files/original/bae16da8ca1cb07bbd64aa18fbe08757.jpg f4e1e8789b31a0394ab1a136d87995ba Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Figurine of St. Joseph Subject The topic of the resource Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum (San Francisco, Calif.) McEnnis, Sr. Francis, D.C. Maginnis, John T., -1864 Canal Zone Grant, Ulyssses S. (Ulysses Simpson), 1822-1885 California--Gold discoveries Cholera Description An account of the resource This figurine was likely hand-carried across the Isthmus of Panama by the Pioneer Sisters traveling to San Francisco, California in 1852. It was among the contents of the corner stone from the original Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum (1852-1873). Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Unknown Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Daughters of Charity, Province of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available N/A Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource ca. 1852 Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource N/A Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource The use of records taken from our collection (quotations, photographs, etc.), must be obtained through written permission from the Provincial Archivist (26000 Altamont Road, Los Altos Hills, CA 94022-4317). If permission is given to reproduce such records, the researcher is required to use our credit line which is as follows: Courtesy of the The Daughters of Charity, Province of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Marble; 2" x 5" Language A language of the resource English Type The nature or genre of the resource Physical Object Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N/A Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant San Francisco, California Isthmus of Panama Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul