Photo Gallery
This bulletin let the citizens of Somerset know of the recent establishment of St. Mary's Seminary. Besides the typical subjects, the school also taught needlework, piano, drawing, painting, embroidery, and French (which was taught by a French woman). The Seminary accepted children ages 6-16 of all denominations, and told parents not to worry--although the educators were Catholic, they would not "induce Children of a different persuasion to embrace the Catholic."
On a hot and dry day in June, an improper flue caused a fire to spark on the chapel's wooden roof. The fire quickly spread to the convent and academy, and raged so fiercely that the friars at St. Joseph's could see the flames from twelve miles away. Despite the help of St. Joseph's priests, brothers, and the townspeople, the fire succeeded in its destruction. The sisters would have to rebuild.
A new school with a new name is founded in a new city--St. Mary of the Springs Academy has officially arrived in Columbus, Ohio. The very first graduating class poses in front of their academy here in 1869, just a year after opening.
Young girls study in the spacious study hall. One of the students, circled with blue pen, is a young Anne O'Hare McCormick, who would later also attend the College of St. Mary of the Springs (now known as Ohio Dominican University). McCormick would become the first woman to join the editorial board of The New York Times and the first woman to ever win the Pulitzer Prize for journalism (which she won in 1937).
The students enjoy an art class outside in the Glen with Srs. M. Evangela Schilder, M. Catherine Cullerton, M. Ambrose Fitzgibbons, and Aloysius Tardeville.
Sr. M. Evangela had lived with the Dominican sisters since she was 6, and had attended the previous St. Mary's school in Somerset as a student. She lived until 92, spending 75 of those years as a sister herself. She was a teacher of music and elocution for 40 years.
Sr. M. Catherine was an art teacher and talented artist who later became the Superior of New York's Dominican Academy.
Sr. Aloysius was another music teacher who was originally from Kentucky. 4 years after this photo was taken, Sr. M. Ambrose would fall ill and pass away at the age of 29. In her last will and testament, she donated the $1000 she inherited from her father ($34,652 in today's value) to the academy.
These students, graduates of 1914, enjoy the academy's library. Two would later become sisters. Edna Snyder, sitting at the table third from the left, professed as Sr. Aquinas in 1917. Sr. Aquinas earned a degree in music and also studied at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. She was a school administrator and a teacher of various grades and music in multiple schools, including the school she once attended herself.
Grace Thimmes, wearing a large bow with her hands on the back of Edna's chair, entered as a Postulant in 1915 and professed as Sr. Borgia a year afterwards. She taught for 20 years and acted as St. Mary's librarian for a time. From the 1940s on, Sr. Borgia aided the academy with her skills of upholstering furniture, general repairs, and making altar breads (AKA communion wafers).
A children's dormitory where the young boarding students would rest and recharge.
The Academy saw sports and exercise as another way to educate and "promote the health of the girls." Besides activities like volleyball and archery, students could also sign up for the riding class--with their parents' permission, of course. An instructor and chaperone would accompany each riding class.
This oil studio displays artwork created by both sisters and students. It was a room inside the Wehrle Art Memorial. Sr. M. Eulalia Wehrle's family commissioned the Wehrle Art Memorial to glorify God and commemorate her parents, and formally donated the three-story building to the academy and community of St. Mary's in 1912.
Besides the oil studio, by 1918 the Italian Renaissance style building also housed a sculpture hall, art library, museum, reception room, picture gallery; and studios devoted to china painting, watercolor, and the "twentieth century fad" of photography. The basement even had kilns to fire china and glass, along with two "large, well-lighted rooms for crafts work; basketry, carpentry, clay-modeling, and taxidermy."
The school's 7th and 8th grade girls stand in the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes, which those in the academy usually just called "the Grotto."
The freshman class of 1925 take a group photo by the academy's front doors.
The school's dining hall is lavishly decorated for the graduating class of 1930, who sit for their commencement dinner.
Sr. Anna Mary keeps a watchful eye on some of the playing children, especially the ones on the merry-go-round. Past catalogues for St. Mary of the Springs Academy boast of the school's playgrounds, with one catalogue stating that "the value of well spent play-time is recognized by the Sisters and neither effort nor expense has been spared in equipping the play-grounds."
From a pamphlet that advertises why people should send their daughters to St. Mary of the Springs Academy. According to the Academy, St. Mary's girls are young Catholic women who honor Christ, the Virgin Mary, their community, country, family, and friends. Four years of classes at the school will supposedly imbue girls with "serenity, maturity, and dependability of character."
By the 1950s, the academy was strictly a secondary school for girls. Students continued to participate in a variety of subjects that included music, piano, art, and Latin. Here, in the yearbook which was composed by the students themselves, are snapshots of the St. Mary's girls' involvement in the classes of home economics, Spanish, French, and geography.
Students weren't the only ones being graded! In this handbook given to faculty members is a page that lets educators see what supervisors will evaluate them on. Besides managing classrooms and working well with other teachers, parents, and the principal; faculty were also assessed on attributes such as their tact, sense of humor, and the sympathy they showed their students during matters of discipline.