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“All aboard!” We would climb the little metal stepstool and enter the coach, beginning another travel adventure in a quiet, spacious, very clean compartment. Sometimes it was to a new and unknown mission, more often it was to summer school. Whatever the destination, it was a wonderful way to go. Train travel has been very important for BVMs from the time of Mary Frances Clarke and her intrepid four others going to Philadelphia in 1833 until passenger trains were phased out in the 1960s. This was true in many places, but frequent transfers made train travel a constant in most BVMs' lives. This mode of transportation wasn't always the treat it later became. Sisters leaving Dubuque for Des Moines in 1865 were in a derailment caused by a snowstorm; they rescued a child from a pond where she had been hurled by the accident and they ended up in a “miserable hotel” in Boone. A stagecoach was the only possibility for the rest of the way and the driver kept upping their fare as the coach dragged through the mud and often became deeply mired, causing their horses to rear and plunge. They had 40 miles of that wretched road before “benumbed and mud-spattered” they arrived in Des Moines. Train travel for the Mother General and/or her council could also be luxurious at times, thanks to BVM Leocritia Ryan in Council Bluffs. Sister-in-law of a railroad executive, with his help she often managed the loan of a temporarily unneeded custom-built private railroad car, complete with porters, chefs, and other amenities. Then the Mother General and her council rode like royalty to distant destinations. While private cars were not for the rest of us, train travel was usually a very pleasant and relaxing way to go although, at times, some incidents enlivened the experience. On a trip west, BVM Leslie Hays (Agnita) and two others set out for San Francisco. As was the custom in this era, one was placed “in charge,” an obligation that frazzled her. Because Sisters were so poorly paid, trains and busses provided “clergy books” of coupons that discounted the fare. Getting them back home 1 for the next traveler was important, so after buying the three tickets, the coupon book was put into the ready envelope and mailed. When the conductor came, the tickets were nowhere and he told the three they must detrain at the next stop. The nervous Sister-in-Charge felt that continually reciting “The Thirty Days Prayer” might rescue them, but that didn't help; the tickets had been mailed with the clergy books. They were not allowed access to the berths they had reserved, and sat up all night, apprehensive every time the train slowed. However the telegram they had frantically sent to their provincial superior, BVM Roberta Kuhn (Alberto), was answered quickly; when they reached Denver the conductor knew that the tickets would be waiting in San Francisco. BVM Veronica (Jackie) Burke (Timothena) also went West as part of a trio, and again, one was selected to be the “superior.” Jackie remembers, “It was 1941. Our provincial had brought three of us to the train, two going to Butte, Mont., the third to San Francisco. She had told us that ordering a la carte was expensive so we obediently ordered three full meals a day. “At a later meal when the waiter passed a huge baked potato to each of us, Joan Frances Crowley and I refused to eat it, so the third member ate all of them so that the waiter might not be ‘disedified'. After retiring we passed the box of Fannie Mae candy the provincial had provided; when the member in the upper berth received it, we got a note, ‘Sisters, it's Lent.' A huge blizzard, lasting three days, hit us in Aberdeen S.D., and kept us snow-bound in the station. Since it was World War II time, the train was packed with sailors about our age. When they realized that their ship would have to sail without them, they left the train to buy a large supply of alcohol, and drank steadily to celebrate their reprieve. “One night as they lurched through the train, one young, very drunk, sailor fell right on top of Joan Frances. She and I put our backs against the window and with our feet, gave him a mighty shove, landing him on the floor of the aisle, too dazed and drunk to get up without lots of noise. Confusion, commotion, lights all followed. From the upper berth came a note, ‘Sisters, it's solemn silence'”! 2 BVM Terese Shinners (Ellena) describes getting dressed in the berth as putting on her complicated clothing in a space little bigger than a coffin. She also remembers what is almost forgotten now, the hassle of always having a companion wherever you were going; at times you had to go out of your way to fulfill that requirement. Therese describes this as “pick up three sisters, drop one, cast off two, like knitting.” To save money, two sisters sometimes shared that coffin-sized berth. They had large boxy hoods and vulnerable borders that were easily crushed plus various “bird cages.” 3 In one such instance, a Sister to get more space, pinned her small sleeves (always detachable for convenience) to what she thought, in the dim light, was the berth's curtain. The next morning she saw her “next berth neighbor” walking off with her narrow black sleeves dangling from his jacket. BVM Kathryn Marie Reichard ( St. John ) had a “red-faced incident,” too. Trains, especially “troop trains,” were very crowded during the Second World War, and Kathryn and her companion were in a line to the diner that was several cars in length. In fact, it stretched right into the club car, where our two habited sisters stood waiting. A well-dressed man saw them and asked if they were trying to get to the diner, and when they said they were, he told them to wait a few minutes. The next thing was a broadcast over the public address system: “Will the Sisters in the bar please come to the diner?” And so they, objects of great interest, threaded their way through the packed coaches. The location of railroad lines had a strong influence when the congregation was divided into provinces in 1914. The thinking was that Chicago shouldn't be one province—it would be too large and might dominate the others—so all four provinces had missions in Chicago and in Iowa. Another purpose for this arrangement was that most Sisters were transferred from mission to mission frequently; this practice served to keep those in distant houses connected and spared the isolation that had induced some groups of sisters to separate from their headquarters and establish local congregations. The map below shows BVM provinces were designed to correlate with major railroads. A provincial superior, using one of them could visit most of the houses in her care. The “yarn lines” show the train routes that tied provinces together.4
Trains enabled the BVMs, headquartered in little Dubuque and a state that the much of the nation thinks is noted for potatoes or for Cincinnati, to be a “national” congregation, serving in many states and happily, drawing members from all of them. Endnotes:
About the author: Jean M. Byrne, BVM (Jean Francis) is a researcher in the BVM Archives and an enthusiastic veteran of train travel. Return to Table of Contents. |
