It is regularly mentioned that Frank Hayden was a student of the legendary Croatian sculptor, Ivan Meštrović. This often overshadows Hayden’s first great mentors: the Sisters of Blessed Sacrament and the faculty at Xavier University of Louisiana.
In the Jim Crow era, Xavier was the only Catholic institution of higher learning established for African-Americans in the Western Hemisphere. Located in the deep south, Xavier was a safe haven, a place where you were protected from the random hatred and disrespect that people of color encountered on a daily basis. On this campus, the faculty believed in your abilities and cared about you like you were family. It was an environment that helped you raise your standards and become the best you. They were there to improve your future, not hinder it.
So how did Xavier University come about? That begins with Mother Katharine Drexel (1858-1955), someone who was a visionary social justice advocate. In the late 1800s, she was a huge force in getting the Catholic Church to put more attention towards the racial injustices happening in the the United States. She advocated for integration of churches, wrote letters to political decision makers, built schools, and worked to shift the myths that typecast Native and African Americans as inferior and incapable. Her work in conjunction with the order she formed, the Sisters of Blessed Sacrament, made a signifiant contribution to improving lives and ending unjust laws. Her vision and dedication in life placed her on the path to being beatified in the years after her death in 1955. This was the first step in her being declared a Saint.
A Saint is someone who “lived a heroically virtuous life, offered their life for others, and who are worthy of imitation.”
Where did Saint Katharine Drexel come from? She grew up Catherine Drexel(different spelling), named after her father’s mother, but she was better known then as Kate. Her family lived in Philadelphia and was part of the upper echelons of society. Kate’s father, Francis Drexel, was part of a banking family and he was a co-founder of the banking giant Drexel, Morgan & Co.(now J. P. Morgan). The company had offices in Philadelphia, New York, San Francisco, London, and Paris, and was involved in financing the Mexican–American War, the California Gold Rush, and the Union Army during the American Civil War, as well as the industrial revolution. All of this generated tremendous wealth, power and notoriety.
They were a loving, close family that did a lot together. Kate would see both sets of grandparents on a weekly basis, as well as aunts and uncles. Kate was particularly close to her mother, Emma Bouvier Drexel, and would soon come to emulate her mother’s devout faith and desire to contribute to humanity.
Both of Kate’s parents were strict Roman Catholics. This involved daily mass and family prayer. Father James O’Connor was a family friend and a daily presence in her life. They were so devout, that when in Italy, they could get an audience with the Pope. Because of this, Kate grew up with an inside view of the role of church in society as well as what it means being a true Christian.
Where did her ideas of philanthropy come from? Though she was raised in privilege, her parents were quick to point out that wealth was merely “loaned to them and was to be shared with those in need.” Kate witnessed this often, as charitable assistance was a weekly part of her household. Her parents were well known philanthropists in Philadelphia. Her mother was particularly dedicated, as she spent 3 days each week working towards helping those in need with food, clothing, medicine, rent money and more. Providing to hundreds of people weekly required Emma Drexel to run her endeavor like a business and she recruited help. In addition to Mrs. Drexel’s assistant, Kate and her sisters would be called to lend a hand. As a result, from a young age, Kate was getting experience in serving others. This planted seeds of deep empathy, which would soon blossom.
How did Kate become Mother Katharine?
In 1879, Emma Drexel was diagnosed with cancer. Kate nursed her for the last three years of her life. A few years later, her father passed away. With her family circle broken, Kate turned more inward and contemplated religious vocation. Even though she was now an heiress and had inherited a significant amount of money, she felt a stronger calling.
The legacy of her parent’s philanthropy was enormous and Kate, along with her sisters felt the obligation to continue it. This began with the old family friend, Father O’Connor, who was now out west and sought help from Kate and her sisters to meet the needs of the disgracefully treated Natives at South Dakota’s Rosebud Reservation.
For the next several years, Kate explored what her future was going to be. It was on a European trip with her sisters that they visited Pope Leo XIII. Kate brought up how the Church should be doing something about helping the Native Americans in the U.S. He challenged her to lead that charge. This encounter would resonate and soon Kate would give up her world of privilege and take a vow of poverty. With this, she started the order of the Sisters of Blessed Sacrament(SBS) in 1891 and became Mother Katharine.
SBS would be her new family. Katharine drew a lot from her own family in shaping this order. In many ways, it became an homage to the values and teachings that she learned growing up. With each year, the SBS family would expand as they would start to build schools, churches and centers in multiple states.
By the early 1900s, Mother Katherine and the SBS began to devote more attention to the education of African American children, starting in Nashville in 1904. This proved to be a challenging endeavor that require imagination, strategy and tenacity. Generally they would have to acquire property for these schools through agents, because local resistance would have blocked it had they been aware.
A decade after starting a school in Nashville, the SBS was called to help in Louisiana. A Josephite priest contacted Mother Katharine with a proposition to take over the recently abandoned Southern University campus of Magazine Street. After an agreement was met they established Xavier Preparatory School. Soon they expanded the scope and were training teachers. By 1925, they expanded further and made history by establishing Xavier University of Louisiana.
In 1932, Xavier University’s campus relocated to the edge of Gert Town at Palmetto Street and South Carrolton Ave. This area, in the early 20th century, was considered the outer parts of New Orleans.
Immediately, this was a hallowed place for people of color. Students came from nearby, as well as from throughout the south and beyond. They became a collective family and the culture of Mother Katherine and the SBS became the culture of Xavier University.
In 1934, when buildings on the new campus began to be built, they expanded their curriculum and introduced a fine arts department. It was overseen by two brothers who were Xavier Prep alumni, Ferdinand and Numa Rouseve. As the art program grew, it came to embody the spiritual and family-oriented culture of the SBS and Xavier. In 1950, a new teacher was added to the faculty, Sister Lurana Neely. Her impact was almost immediate as she helped students tap into their talent. From there she would help them find avenues to utilize those talents.
By Sister Lurana’s third year, in 1953, she would meet a new student from Memphis, Frank Hayden. Little did he know that the next four years would change his life and a cornerstone would be set.
-Bennet Rhodes
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Readings
xula.libguides.com/XULAArchives
wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Crow_laws
usccb.org/offices/public-affairs/saints
womenofthehall.org/inductee/st-katharine-drexel.
franciscanmedia.org/franciscan-spirit-blog/the-legacy-of-saint-katharine-drexel.
vatican.va/news_services/liturgy_katharine-drexel
philanthropyroundtable.org/hall-of-fame/st-katharine-drexel/
Katherine Burton, The Golden Door: The Life of Katharine Drexel (P. J. Kennedy, 1958)
Daniel McSheffery, Saint Katharine Drexel (Catholic Book Publishing, 2002)
Ellen Tarry, Saint Katharine Drexel: Friend of the Oppressed (Farrar Strauss, 1958)
nobility.org/2018/03/noblesse-oblige-part-1/
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1006058.pdf
drexel.edu/news/archive/2020/january/hidden-treasures-francis-martin-drexel
drexel.edu/news/archive/2017/july/drexels-collection
phillyhistory.org/index.php/2016/01/tony-drexel-goes-for-a-walk-part-i/