Our Catltolic Heritage in Texas
celebrated his golden jubilee. The recorder of the event aptly said, "These Sisters have close ties with Texas.... This congregation, created by Bishop Dubuis in 1866, has developed prodigiously, and is now divided into three great independent branches: Galveston, San Antonio, and Villeurbonne.... This is the reason why Mother Angelic and Mother Assistant St. Laurent ... have taken part in the feast today. This is why Bishop Dubuis, surrounded by his priests, was happy to celebrate his golden jubilee in that country." 20 T/1e Establishment of St. Joseph's Infirmary in Hozt,ston. The trying years of the 187o's became but a memory in the succeeding decade. The community had grown to over fifty Sisters. Private patients and railroad patients were coming from everywhere in the State. A request came in 1887 from Houston, where although there was a City Hospital and a railroad hospital, there was no private general hospital. One of the social leaders of Houston, Mrs. Henry Gardes, approached Father Thomas Hennessy, Pastor of Annunciation Church in Houston, on this subject. Having obtained a promise of aid from the Mother Superior in Galveston, Father Hennessy then secured the approval of the Most Reverend Bishop N. A. Gallagher for the undertaking. The Bishop turned over to the Sisters early in February an old but substantial two-story building on Franklin and Caroline Streets that had been erected during the Civil War. 1 t was quickly renovated, the two floors were made ready for patients, the first for men, the second for women, and bathroom facilities with running water were installed. The new hospital was formally opened early in June, 1887, 21 under the advocation of St. Joseph, with a staff of eight Sisters from St. Mary's Infirmary, Galveston. Mother Louis, who soon became widely known in Houston, was named superior of the new community. The people of Hous- ton, regardless of class or creed, united to give the Sisters a healthy welcome. From the day of their arrival, the Sisters unremittingly and devotedly have served the sick and the ailing. Two years after the open- ing, another building was erected for the accommodation of county and charity patients. St. Joseph's was shortly afterwards put to its severest test. In December, 1890, Houston became aware of a scourge that called for 10 /bid., 37-38. 21 The date is given as March II, 1887, by Sister Mary Climacus Shelly, C.C.V.I., in "Catholic Hospitalization in Texas" (B.A. thesis, Incarnate Word Convent, San Antonio, 1936), p. 13.
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