Our Catlzotic Heritage in Texas
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Secretary of State. At the close of the year 1884, the Sisters of the San Antonio community were conducting eleven schools, one hospital, and two orphanages in Texas. At the death of Reverend Mother St. Pierre in 1891, the Congregation numbered three hundred Sisters in charge of twenty-nine institutions in Texas, Missouri, and Mexico. As the Congregation grew in numbers, the need arose for a more desir- able location to serve as a Motherhouse. In 1897, the Sisters purchased Fernridge, the two hundred and eighty acre suburban estate of Colonel George W. Brackenridge, and on June 4 the community took possession of the property with its beautiful mansion, now used as a Guest House at Incarnate Word Convent. Here the Sisters resided until 1900, when the new five-story Motherhouse was completed at a short distance from the mansion. The broad acres of wooded park at the headwaters of the San Antonio River formed an ideal location for a school for girls, and in September of 1900, Incarnate Word Academy, which had been first established in 1893 on Crosby Street, was transferred to the Motherhouse. In 1909 the college program was added, and today Incarnate Word College is one of the leading Catholic colleges for women in the United States. Final approbation of the Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word of San Antonio was given by His Holiness, Pope Pius X in 1910. In 1921, the General Council obtained permission from the Holy See to establish four provinces, with central houses at San Antonio, Mexico City, St. Louis, and New Orleans. The New Orleans Province has since been discontinued and its institutions have been placed under the jurisdic- tion of the St. Louis and San Antonio Provinces. The Motherhouse re- mained in San Antonio. The Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word now numbers nine hundred and fifty-four professed Sisters, forty-four novices, and twenty-seven postulates in seventy-three institutions located in Texas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Mexico, and Ireland. These include thirty parochial schools, nine high schools, eleven Cotegios and lnstitutos in Mexico, the Incarnate Word College in San Antonio, a House of Studies in Ireland, twelve hospitals, four orphanages, one home for the aged Sisters, one social welfare agency, and three provincial houses. The Sister conduct a total of forty-five institutions in Texas, including Incarnate Word College, San Antonio; high schools in Amarillo, Del Rio, Windhorst, Fort Worth, Kosciusko, and San Antonio; eight parochial
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