Category Archives: Archives

June 9, 2023 · 9:35 am

The Lumière of St. Louise

Typically, in these posts, we try to focus on materials held here at the local Provincial Archives.  For this post, however, we would like to focus on a piece of global news of the Daughters and the archival world.

Saint Louise de Marillac portrait, held in the Provincial Archives in Emmitsburg

One of the foundational documents of the history and spirituality of the Daughters of Charity is the Lumière of Saint Louise de Marillac, the co-founder of the community alongside Saint Vincent de Paul.  In 1623, on the Feast of Pentecost, Louise found herself in a deep melancholy, with her husband seriously ill, an uncertain future for herself, and a crisis of faith at hand.  In a moment of prayer, she had a vision of the pathway of her life.  She saw herself when she “would be in a position to make vows of poverty, chastity and obedience and that I would be in a small community where others would do the same.”  She added, “I was also assured that I should remain at peace concerning my director; that God would give me one whom He seemed to show me.”  She felt assurance that “it was God who was teaching me these things…I should not doubt the rest.”

It took a decade for the work of her vision to come to pass.  She did find a spiritual director in Saint Vincent, and, in 1633, they together founded the “Little Company” of the Daughters of Charity.  Saint Louise carried the folded message that she wrote to herself on Pentecost until her death.

St. Louise’s Lumière

The 400th Anniversary of this Pentecost has just passed.  The folded note of Saint Louise had survived for centuries in the Archive of the Vincentian Fathers, Saint Vincent’s priestly community.  As a magnanimous gesture and a symbol of the fraternal ties between the Vincentians and the Daughters of Charity, the Vincentians repatriated the Lumière back to the Daughters of Charity.  It will live and be preserved in their Mother House at the Rue du Bac in Paris as one of the great historical and spiritual treasures of the Community’s charism!

Father Tomaz Mavric and Sister Francois Petit, Superior and Superioress of the Daughters of Charity, with Sister Francois holding the Lumiere

Although the Provincial Archives does not hold any primary sources of Saint Louise, we can provide a wide array of resources on Louise’s spirituality and the way it is interpreted and lived today through the Community that she founded.  These include scholarship related to Louise and many works named after her, including St. Louise de Marillac School in Arabi, Louisiana; St. Louise de Marillac School in St. Louis; St. Louise de Marillac Hospital in Buffalo, New York; and the Association Louise de Marillac lay organization.

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October 12, 2022 · 9:18 am

The Hospital Newsletters

The Daughters of Charity were extensively involved in many hospitals over the years, dating back to 1823 in answer to a call to staff the Baltimore Infirmary.  The predecessor Provinces that combined in 2011 to form our current Province of St. Louise sponsored and/or operated many hospitals stretching from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic Coast. 

In the 1950s and ‘60s, almost every hospital the Daughters owned or operated began publishing a newsletter, which documented some of the special events, major changes, and goings-on among doctors, staff, and administrators.  Essentially, they functioned as the newspapers of the hospitals and, as such, contained information that is valuable both to scholars and to general researchers. 

For example, the News Notes of Providence Hospital provides a chronicle of the Hospital’s move from Detroit to Southfield, Michigan over the course of 1964 and 65.

In February 1985, the Lifeline, out of Seton Medical Center in Austin, reported on the Hospital and its service during and after a rare Texas snowstorm, providing a resource to a specific event in the history of Central Texas as it related to the hospital. 

The Esprit de Corps out of Hotel Dieu in New Orleans made sure to list every new student in the Hotel Dieu School of Nursing in 1948 – one of the earliest newsletters from any of the hospitals.  For those researching a parent, aunt, or grandparent who attended the school, these newsletters continue to provide an opportunity for more information or photographs.

For those with family members who worked at the hospitals, these newsletters often mention or profile staff members, particularly those who were there for extended periods of time.

Currently, the newsletters are available on-site, but not yet available in digitized form.  However, they can easily be searched by staff with a location and a year range provided by the researcher.

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Filed under Archives, Hospitals, Hotel Dieu, New Orleans, Providence Hospital, Southfield, Seton Medical Center, Austin

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May 3, 2022 · 9:48 am

The Life of an Archival Intern

This is a guest post by our archival intern for the semester, Jenna Brady, Mount St. Mary’s University class of 2023.

My time at this internship has been a very enlightening experience, as it has served to not only give me more information on the history of the Daughters of Charity, but has also been extremely instructive about the processes of archival work. I have had the opportunity to work on many different projects while I have been working at the Daughters of Charity Archives including recording West Provincial Newsletters from the 1970s, transcribing Italian letters, transcribing the oral history of Sister Isidore Allain, and assisting in putting together one of the exhibits that are on display. In this post, I would like to discuss my encounters with each of these projects and highlight some of the skills I have been provided with through my work.

St. Louis, MO Marillac Provincial House, RG 11-3, Box 65, Newsletters Box

The first project that I was able to focus on during the internship was going through the newsletters from the 1970s of the West Central Province. The newsletters chronicled many important events that happened for the sisters throughout that time including the canonization of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton and many important meetings that would take place in Rome that the sisters would attend. The newsletters also served to chronicle the monthly lives of the sisters and their many placements throughout the province. These newsletters showed the progression of the province as things around them began to change in the world during the 70s. I recorded all of these newsletters into an excel sheet that will provide information about people and places mentioned within the newsletters so that it is easier to pinpoint the information.

While working in the archives, I also had the opportunity to listen to and transcribe the oral history of Sister Isidore Allain. This allowed me not only to hear Sister Allain’s story through her own words but also to understand all of the work that goes into transcribing an oral history. Its an experience that will certainly stick with me as I was able to hear a firsthand account of history from the direct word of the woman who lived through it. It also helped me to see how an individual story tied into the overarching period of the West Central Province.

The final project that I want to mention working on is the exhibit that recently opened in the archives on April 26th. There are now two new exhibits open in the archives both focusing on the lives and works of the sisters of the province. The exhibit that I was able to assist with highlights all those who live and work at the Emmitsburg campus in the different departments. It was an honor learning about all of the different departments and people who assist throughout the various ministries that occur here.

Images from Exhibit at the Daughters of Charity Provincial Archives
Images from Exhibit at the Daughters of Charity Provincial Archives

The experiences that I have had while working at the Daughters of Charity Archives have given me a deeper understanding of everything that is included in archival work and it has been an honor being able to learn so many new things. I have truly enjoyed my time here and look forward to learning even more about the sisters in the future.

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