Influenza Pandemic and the Sisters
...ncent de Paul to aid the victims of the flu.[5] The sisters of numerous religious orders across the city would play an indispensable role in fighting the flu. Throughout the course of the flu, over 2,000 nuns, about two-thirds of all sisters in the archdiocese, helped care for the sick,
Misericordia Hospital
...ding a hospital.[2] So with the support of the Archbishop, Mother Mary Patricia Waldron, head of the order in Philadelphia, purchased a farm plot for $100,000 after having to mortgage most of the Sister’s properties.[3] To help offset the costs, Prendergast started a fundraising campaign in 1915, which raised over
Mary Brackett Willcox and Catholicism in the Suburbs
A New England Puritan becomes a prominent and influential Catholic in the Diocese of Philadelphia. An unlikely story but one that happened to Mary Brackett. Mary was born in 1796 in Massachusetts to Captain James Brackett and Elizabeth Odiorne.[1] In 1819, she married James Mark Willcox from Ivy Mill, PA.[2]
Hometown Saint: Katharine Drexel and the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament in Philadelphia
...abandonment of the Indian and Colored races.” The new order, the first to minister to the needs of Native-Americans and African-Americans, grew slowly. In 1892, twelve postulates received the habit of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament (SBS). Ultimately, more than 100 SBS educational intuitions, including Xavier University in New