Fables and Rewrites and Truth

The more I learn about my grandmother's time at St. Kate's, the clearer it becomes that I know nothing at all.

Or perhaps I am just learning that all family stories should be appreciated for their colorfulness not necessarily their veracity.

In any case, the story becomes less sparkly in that controversial way but more truthful or at least more representative of factual accounting - however possible that is over a hundred years later.

It turns out that my grandmother was at St. Kate's with two sisters, her older brother, and two "cousins" from the family that inherited the Varela siblings.

It appears they went home every summer to Las Cruces and one year one of her sisters stayed home--perhaps she was sick. That year my grandma did not pass to the next academic level, making me think that she was worried.

Yes, like previous stories about her time there, this is a creation of the mind. All I know for sure is one was not on the rolls for a particular year and that same year the other did not pass.

The data for this story creation is sparse, incomplete and wrapped on its own fable about Indian education.

This story making is a new theme among many that are emerging from the archive research.

Resume Button

Without any of the intervening updates, I find myself at Drexel's Shrine researching the congregation, the school and my grandmother's participation in it.

Already some of the puzzle pieces are recovered, though they do not necessarily fit together yet.

My grandmother's name appears haphazardly in the enrollment records, perhaps because it was the most complicated. Margarita became Maggie and Corina need not change though the spelling was sometimes altered to a more English sounding Corinne. Aureliano, not Pete, shows up at the beginning and then in subsequent years though not necessarily contiguously. Another person who may be a "cousin" also shows up. Grandma is not there contiguously either ...leading to more questions than answers.

Were they all sent in a difficult year and the older ones brought home occasionally to work? Were they always there and just not always accounted for?

I am doing academic research, with scant time to get through all the folders. So the time with the grandma stuff is limited.

I am seriously considering giving tomorrow's shorter day to family stuff. We'll see ...

Kate and Katie part 2

Katharine Drexel has become the focus of a lot of my research of late. I know more about this woman than I will probably ever know about my grandmother or her time at St. Catherine's Indian School.

Sometimes I am okay with this fact, and, sometimes, it drives me crazy.

The truth is Drexel was way ahead of her time at the same time she was a product of her time. I try always to see her within the context of her own historical time period.

There is no denying that she impacted the lives of generations of students (and continues to do so at places like Xavier University). I may not be the most religious person, or not even religious at all, but there are many qualities about Katharine that are most admirable, not the least of which is her determination to do that which she thought would change the world. If only we all had that much conviction.

Saint Katharine's feast day is March 3rd. So, I guess this is a little early feast day tribute for her. Later this week, I will be giving a paper that I wrote about Katharine's biographers and how their stories contributed to her canonization. I wish and hope that someday I will be able to give a talk about my grandmother and what it was like to be her...

This is one of my favorite pieces that is readily available about Saint Katharine Drexel. If you want to know more about her, I recommend it, or you can read more about her at the Drexel shrine page (link at the end of this post).

Katharine (left) and Elizabeth (right) were born to Francis Anthony Drexel and his first wife, Hannah Langstroth Drexel. Katharine was born on November 26, 1858. Hannah died of complications five weeks later. Louise was the daughter of Francis and his second wife Emma Bouvier Drexel.

This miniature was painted when Katharine was about 18 years old. She made her debut in January, 1879 at the age of 20.

Kate traveled to the Pittsburg Mercy convent on May 6, 1889, to begin training in religious life as a necessary preparation for establishing a new congregation to work with the Black and Indian peoples.

On Feb. 12, 1891, in pronouncing her vows, St. Katharine became the first Sister of the Blessed Sacrament in the chapel of the Sisters of Mercy in Pittsburg. Ten novices and three postulants joined her.

These photos were all borrowed from the www.katharinedrexel.org website. The captions are also taken from the website.

A Sweet Valentine

For my valentine, the universe gave me the opportunity to see inside St. Catherine's.

These are a few shots from the outside...
Details and photos on the inside tour will have to wait until I write up my field notes for class... I promise to share what I can.

Kate and Katie part 1

*** I was going to post this piece second, but in honor of my grandmother's birthday ... she would be 106 today if she were alive... I am going to post it today.
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Maybe I am a little dense or it says something about the power of stories. All my life, my grandmother, whose beautiful name was Enriqueta (the one I was to be named for, if I was a boy?!), went by Katie. Everyone has always said it was because "Queta" became Katie.

Now I am pretty sure it was the name that the nuns gave her when she got to St. Catherine's. I wonder just how many orphans that ended up at St. Kate's became Katies. Her sisters had names that were easy to translate, so they became Maggie and Cori (from Margarita and Corina).

It's not clear if my uncle Pete (yeah, prove that the nuns didn't give him that name ... from Aureliano) was at St. Kate's before he ran away and started working to be able to support his sisters... but with the name like "Pete" it's sure that someone rebaptized him.

Here are some pictures of my grandmother.

This is the only photo I have from my grandma's time at St. Catherine's. At least, I imagine it has to be from that time because there are no other photos of her life before her parents died... that I could get my hands on, anyway. This was in a shoebox in my dad's closet with a few of his favorite things. Since he put me in charge of the family history he can't really get angry at me for esculcando...


This is my grandparents with their new grandson, my brother, aka the golden child. He's the original.

I love this photo... in fact, I have been carrying it around with me since last summer. It is my grandpa, my brother, my mom with sister as bun in the oven, my aunt, my grandma (Katie) and my other grandma. I love the look on Katie's face as she is watching my mom and brother and grandpa. He (the golden child) was her favorite for a long while... no one can deny it.


My grandparents, my mom and my sister in El Paso on a family trip... guessing my dad took the pic, not sure where my brother was, but I am pretty sure he was getting into trouble.

Grandma and grandpa (?) with my aunt, my brother and a "cousin" from El Paso.

My grandmother with all her grandchildren through 1967... there would be at least five more to come including me.

Here is my grandma with her children at a family reunion circa 1980...a few years after my grandpa died and a few before my grandma would leave us too.

This is as close to Uncle Pete as I can get with the photos I have. This is his house, his front step, and my brother and I sitting next to his great-grand daughter ... who I don't even remember but my mom informs that is who the other little girl is in the picture. [Circa 1971]


[All photos scanned from my mom's collection ... since they are in a box, I feel it is OK to swipe them, scan them and share with my siblings and cousins.]

One Friday...

I found free parking in the De Vargas Shopping Center the first day I was scheduled to work at Fray Angelico Chavez History Library in the Santa Fe Plaza. I parked on the side with a grocery story, in the farthest corner of the lot, hoping not to be noticed by any parking police. It is only about a fifteen minute walk from there to the Plaza. After a long day reading through school newsletters, I returned to my car. I had no real concept, at the time, where in Santa Fe I was in relationship to St. Catherine's. I looked up. Right across the street from where I was parked, I noticed the cemetery. There it was, my grandmother's school building. Somehow I had managed to park right across the street from it.

Taken from outside the gates,
the bell tower of the three story adobe
that was the original
building constructed in 1897.
Taken by me, 2/11/11

Recently, I passed by the school gates and noticed that someone had cleaned away the brush from near the gates surrounding the property and installed large NO TRESPASSING signs painted in emergency yellow. I determined to come back and take more pictures now that the buildings were more visible and I had a new, fancy camera. Friday, February 11, 2011, I had the opportunity to do just that. I got just one shot of the bell tower before the camera battery died. Ashley, also on her way to work in the archive, agreed to accompany me on the trip to the school. As we were walking back to the car, we noticed the gates were open and we could hear the sound of someone working on the property. It sounded like something hitting the sides of the buildings, or at least that is where my imagination went. Ashley noticed a tractor. I knew the property owner had been trying to develop the land since at least 2002. Every project has been rejected, first because of the deed requiring that the land must have some educational use, and later because eleven of the structures, including the cemetery, are listed on the state historic registry. I thought that if I could get the owner's phone number, I might be able to get permission to take photos of the buildings before any development could begin on the property. It is only a matter of time before a developer overcomes the hurdles and the buildings are destroyed. The buildings are already covered with graffiti.

Building with wave graffiti,
behind the trees you can
see the tractor. Photos taken
by Ashley, camera phone, 2/11/11

It was cold, but not as cold as it had been in the past few weeks. There was still snow covering the unpaved patch of road that leads up to the gates and into the school property. Ashley agreed to trespass with me, snapping pictures with her phone of the tractor she called a bulldozer. We walked past the six or seven foot high sign stating NO TRESSPASSING towards the man on the tractor was moving dirt and snow, cleaning an area that looked like a parking lot. He was bundled up in a bulky jacket and had his back to us as we approached. When we got close enough, I waved so that I was sure that he had seen up approaching. He saw us and turned off the machine. Ashley continued to snap pictures with her phone. I started to talk to the man on the tractor. He had red hair and the cold made his cheeks pink. He squinted at me as I told him why I was there, and hesitated when he started to answer me. Before he could get to far into it, I asked him, "Hablas espanol?" He relaxed his shoulders and started to speak to me in Spanish. Suddenly I was welcome, and he would help me. He had understood my question, but didn't have the owner's name and contact information. But, Alfredo, in the building surely would have it. I explained that I wanted to take pictures, and that my grandmother had been a student. He got down off the tractor and led Ashley and I into a building labeled "Library." It looked like a modular building, not as I had imagined it from the historic preservation documents I read last fall.


The library.
Photo taken by Ashley,
with her phone, 2/11/11

He brought us into the building and motioned to Alfredo, saying something about me wanting to talk to him. Still speaking in Spanish, I introduced myself and explained that I am working on a project and that my grandmother was a student. Safely delivered, the tractor driver left the building and returned to his machine. The "library" seemed to be the staging area for the project. There were some tables with lots of tools, and two men working on putting together old chairs. There were several chairs in various stages of construction in the middle of room; part of the floor was carpeted. The room smelled of turpentine or some kind of stain or both. It was warmer inside the building, and I hoped that they didn't have a heater on with those chemicals. All of the workers stopped to listen to our conversation. Alfredo took off his gloves to shake hands with both Ashley and me. He got out his cell phone and looked up the owner. He looked at me with just my keys sticking out of my pocket and a camera around my neck. He said something about me not having a way to write down the number. I pointed to Ashley told him that she would put the number for me in her phone. He called out the numbers and Ashley typed them into her phone. I knew the answer, but asked the owner's name anyway. Alfredo answered what I expected to hear: M T. Mr. T bought the property hoping to sell it to a developer and make a lot of money. Instead, he has been sitting on a multi-million dollar property without a real prospect since 2007. Since last October, T has been "cleaning" the property in order to sell it and taking heat for not properly maintaining historic buildings.

I tried to take in everything that was going on in the room. I wondered where all the books had been taken. This room didn't look like a library though there were some empty shelves. I noticed the top of a plastic soda bottle cut in two on the floor underneath a table. It might have been something the workmen used to mix the stain or paint; or it might have been left over from people squatting in this building. I didn't want to seem too much like I was surveying the area, though, I had a bigger plan, to get permission to come back and take pictures inside and outside the buildings. This might be the only chance I had to make a good impression. The excitement passed, the other two workers started in on the chairs again. One kneeling on the floor was wiping down pieces of a chair seat and putting them together as though they were puzzle pieces. That worker looked down at his wooden pieces, and then put a mask up to his face while he worked. What was the purpose of putting old chairs back together? They weren't antique chairs, just old chairs, probably circa 1960 wooden chairs. Was this clean up part of a historic project? Is it staging for the real estate agent?

Building opposite the library
and Alfredo's truck. This building
has paintings that seem to be
part of the original structure along
with graffiti. Taken by
Ashley with phone, 2/11/11.

I asked what they were doing on the property. Alfredo said they were cleaning up the place and working on some of the buildings. I asked about the murals in the main building. Were they still there? In okay shape? Alfredo started for the door, he said if he had the keys with him, he would show us the murals right now. Ashley and I followed Alfredo out towards his truck. Ashley continued to snap pictures of the buildings. I could not believe of all days not to have an extra charged battery for my camera, this was the worst one. Around my neck hung my camera like a very heavy, expensive and not very stylish accessory, useless. After rifling through his things, Alfredo announced that he didn't have the keys. He motioned to the buildings and the grounds, and said that they are there everyday trying to clean up the place and fix up the buildings. He invited me to come back, any day; he'll be there every day.

Building opposite the
Library. It has paintings
along the top and two
figures on the main archway.
Graffiti covers some of the
Art along the top of the building.

Below: Close up of building and
paintings. Photos taken by
Ashley with phone, 2/11/11.

As we walked back towards the car, I could see the edge of the cemetery. I would like to take a look around that cemetery. The artist, Edward O'Brien, who showed up at the school one day and stayed, painted the murals in the main building and is buried there. From the outside, the buildings don't appear to be crumbling even though some are almost one hundred years old. The main building is almost 114 years old. It was a good day to go trespassing.

Back posting

While we were on the now infamous twenty-one day car trip, my father kept his own little record of things.

I am going to start posting these little snatches ... and I will post them back on the dates that they were recorded... so for those not subscribing to the feed, you may have to go searching for them.

Or, I might get fancy and put links here...

Stay tuned.

Some photos from the latest foray into the territory on 2.14.2011

currently

The past six days have seen a lot of movement on this project... two trips to Santa Fe, both to the campus of St. Catherine's and a little paper and a great class discussion AND a new lead...

I have a long piece to post about visiting the school on Monday (the universe's valentine present to me) and a ton of pictures.

I will share the encounter that led up to that as well... wrote it up for class. In due time, that is not today because I have so much DUE!

However, today, I got ANOTHER tip... perhaps a missing link to my paper... the parent connection!!

I sent an email asking for a chance to speak to the parent of two graduates. This parent was apparently involved in the parent advisory group or at least active at the school. So, this is a super exciting development.

Some recent articles... related to the work I did this week. Read them quick, you never know how long they will be available. And by recent, I mean in geological terms, so from last year mostly.

I will share here the one picture I could take before the batteries ran out on Friday, February 11th... sheesh, I own two batteries, too, but both were DEAD. Never again, I swear.