My Visit with the Sisters of St. Agnes

I just returned from Fond du Lac, Wisconsin where I visited the Sisters of St. Agnes, who ran the school in Catherine, Kansas starting in 1899.  I interviewed eight sisters.  Some of them were originally from Catherine  and a few just worked in the school (1st-8th grade) between 1946-1951.  While I still need to conduct a few more interviews and compare it with my primary and secondary source research, there are  few conclusions that are important:

1. Why the women joined the Sisters of St. Agnes from Catherine?:  There are a few answers to this question.  First, the women felt a legitimate call from God to join the order.  Second, most of them wanted to be teachers or nurses, which was the primary goal of the order.  Third, joining the sisters offered upward mobility for those who joined.  Almost all of them attended high school and received either college or graduate degree.  In the secular world, during the late 1940s and early 1950s, that was much harder for women to do.

2. Overall, the sisters liked working in Catherine:  Out of the 3 sisters I interviewed who came to Catherine to work (between 1946-1951), only one felt see did not feel completely welcome in the community.  All the sisters I interviewed did not speak German, which was difficult when the whole town spoke that language, and did not interact much with the community due to rules by the order.  The sisters felt the young Catherine students liked learning, were engaging students, and the parents fostered an environment that supported education.

3. When the younger generation stopped speaking German?:  I'm still working on this question.  I think it really determines the shape of the community.  The sisters who arrived in 1946 indicate that the students spoke German and one sister who grew up in Catherine and professed to the order in 1955 claims she did not learn German (the latter sister would be 78).  This means that starting in the early 1950s, parents stopped teaching their children German and the children started to assimilate.  This was most likely an after affect of World War II.

The trip produced some great insights for this project and I want to thank all the sisters at Fond du Lac who helped with the project!