Historic Resting Place for Famous and Faithful
Commodore John Barry, father of the American Navy. George Meade, grandfather of Civil War hero General George Meade. Katrina, Philadelphia servant. Katrina? What does a servant girl have in common with these decorated war heroes and well-known patriots? They share a final resting place in Old St. Mary’s Cemetery where
The Other Drexel: Louise Drexel Morrell
The name of Mother Katharine Drexel is familiar to many Catholics both within and outside the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. However, her sister, Louise Drexel Morrell is little remembered. Only the Morrell Park section of Northeast Philadelphia, which occupies the former site of her family estate “San Jose”, as well as
Anti-Catholicism in Jacksonian Philadelphia
Anti-Catholicism was present in America since its founding though, by the early 19th century it had become “largely rhetorical.” The influx of Catholic immigrants, however, as well as the increasingly aggressive and authoritarian stance of the papacy, which became more outspoken in its denunciations of modernism and liberalism, established a
Philadelphia’s First Bishop
Philadelphia’s first Bishop, the Irish-born Franciscan Michael Egan, was appointed a full century after the American colonists began the practice of their Catholic Faith in the New World. The colony of Pennsylvania, chartered in 1681 with William Penn as proprietor, offered the safety of religious tolerance, but 50 years passed