Katharine Drexel, Founder of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament (SBS) Katherine Drexel was an American Catholic religious sister, and educator. In 1891, she founded the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, a religious congregation serving Black and Indigenous Americans.
Marianne Cope, OSF,, was a German-born American religious sister who was a member of the Sisters of St. Francis of Syracuse, New York, and founding leader of its St. Joseph's Hospital in the city, among the first of 50 general hospitals in the country. Known also for her charitable works, in 1883 she relocated with six other sisters to Hawaiʻi to care for persons suffering leprosy on the island of Molokaʻi and aid in developing the medical infrastructure in Hawaiʻi. Despite direct contact with the patients over many years, Cope did not contract the disease.
The Diocese of Savannah is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory, or diocese, of the Catholic Church in southern Georgia in the United States. The mother church of the diocese is Cathedral Basilica of Saint John the Baptist in Savannah. The patron saint is John the Baptist.
Susie King Taylor was an American nurse, educator and memoirist. She is known for being the first African-American nurse during the American Civil War. Beyond just her aptitude in nursing the wounded of the 1st South Carolina Volunteer Infantry Regiment, Taylor was the first Black woman to self-publish her memoirs. She was the author of Reminiscences of My Life in Camp with the 33rd United States Colored Troops, Late 1st S.C. Volunteers. She was also an educator to formerly bonded Black people in the Reconstruction-era South by opening various schools in Georgia. Taylor would also be a part of organizing the 67 Corps of the Women's Relief Corps in 1886.
The Sisters of St. Francis of Perpetual Adoration is a papal congregation of the Roman Catholic Church, founded on July 20, 1863, by Mother Maria Theresia Bonzel in Olpe, Germany. In 1875, they opened St. Elizabeth Hospital in Lafayette, Indiana; now part of the Franciscan Health healthcare system. In 1890 they founded Saint Francis Normal School, a teacher training school; which is now the University of Saint Francis (Indiana).
The Franciscan Handmaids of the Most Pure Heart of Mary are a historically Black Catholic congregation of nuns co-founded by Mary Theodore Williams and Ignatius Lissner in 1916. They follow the Rule of the Third Order of St. Francis. Their primary mission has always been education, primarily of children of the African-American community.
Mary Elizabeth Lange, OSP was an American religious sister in Baltimore, Maryland who founded the Oblate Sisters of Providence in 1829, the first African-American religious congregation in the United States. She was also, via the Oblates, the first African-American superior general.
The College of Saint Teresa was a Catholic women's college in Winona, Minnesota. Previously a women's seminary, it became a college in 1907 and was operated by the Sisters of Saint Francis of Rochester, Minnesota until its closing in 1989.
The Healy family was an Irish-American and African-American family notable for the high achievements of its first generation of children, who were born into slavery in Georgia in the second half of the nineteenth century.
Mary Ignatius Hayes, O.S.F., also known as Mother Mary Ignatius of Jesus, was an Anglican religious sister who was later received into the Catholic Church and became a Franciscan sister. Her lifetime of religious service, in the course of which she traveled widely, led to the establishment of three separate religious congregations of Franciscan sisters and the establishment of the Poor Clare nuns in the United States.
Alice Woodby McKane was the first woman to work as a medical doctor in Savannah, Georgia. She was not only known as a physician but also as a politician and an author. She and her husband Cornelius McKane contributed an important part in medical history. She opened the first school of nurse training for black people in Savannah. She also helped her husband to make his dream which was opening the Hospital in Liberia come true. After returning from Liberia, they established the MCKane Hospital for Women and Children and later was known as Charity Hospital to treat for all people in Savannah, especially for African American people.
Franciscan Sisters of Baltimore were the American members of a Roman Catholic religious congregation of women founded in the London suburb of Mill Hill, England, in 1868. Connected to the Society of Mill Hill Missionaries from the time of their founding, they were committed to serving the needy of the world. Members of the congregation came to the United States in 1881, where they were the first white religious order dedicated to serve the African-American population of Baltimore. The United States Province merged with the Sisters of St. Francis of Assisi in 2001 and continue their ministry in Baltimore.
Francesca Thompson is an American member of the Sisters of St. Francis of Oldenburg, Indiana. She was at one point a leading academic in the field of theater and African-American studies.
Mary Kevin Kearny, OSF, CBE was a teacher, Franciscan Sister, and missionary, who founded a new Franciscan order. Born in Arklow, Ireland on April 28, 1875, she became a Junior Assistant Mistress at 17 and taught in Essex, England. On December 2, 1902, she left to begin missionary work in Nsambya, Uganda, working as a Franciscan Sister of Saint Mary's Abbey, Mill Hill, London.
Carrie Steele Logan was an American philanthropist, founder of the oldest black orphanage in the United States. The home, The Colored Orphanage of Atlanta, was officially dedicated on June 20, 1892.
Black Catholicism or African-American Catholicism comprises the African-American people, beliefs, and practices in the Catholic Church.
Mary Theodore Williams, F.H.M. was an American Black Catholic nun who founded the Franciscan Handmaids of the Most Pure Heart of Mary in 1916.
Mary Antona Ebo, FSM, was an American nun, hospital administrator, and civil rights activist. She was the first African-American woman to head a Catholic hospital, and is known for marching with Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma in 1965, famously saying "I'm here because I'm a Negro, a nun, a Catholic, and because I want to bear witness." She was a member of the Franciscan Sisters of Mary.
The Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia is an Aston Township, Pennsylvania-based women's religious congregation of the Third Order of Saint Francis founded in 1855 by Maria Anna Boll Bachmann, an immigrant from Bavaria. The congregation is known for its work in education and healthcare.
