Starting Over, Mates...

Justyna Steuer Carlson, who keeps me up to date on all GCU news of sisters who have resided at McAuley Hall in North Plainfield, and tries to keep my spiritual life in order... a more difficult task, she'll acknowledge ... sent this sad bit today. Sister Mary Peter was the lady who must have been deputized to call me each year to thank me for my donation. I missed the call this past December and now I know why. What a great woman and a long-time treasure for GCU!

 

 

	Sr. Mary Peter Coakley Home: Watchung, NJ Date of Death: January 15, 2013 Age: 97 Birthdate: July 18, 1915 Place of Birth: South Amboy, NJ Service Information: Friday, January 18, 2013 11:00 AM St. Catherine Of Siena Chapel, Watchung, NJ Visitation: Friday, January 18, 2013 9:00 - 11:00 a.m. St. Catherine of Siena Chapel Interment: Holy Redeemer Cemetery, South Plainfield, NJ Sister Mary Peter Coakley, Sister of Mercy Sister Mary Peter, 97, died peacefully Tuesday, January 15, 2013 at McAuley Hall Health Care Center in Watchung, NJ Born in South Amboy, she was educated at St. Mary Elementary School and High School in South Amboy and entered the Sisters of Mercy in 1932. Her early teaching began at Our Lady Star of the Sea School in Atlantic City, NJ where she taught for 7 years. In 1946 she began her studies at Georgian Court which was the beginning of her career in chemistry. She received a BA degree in chemistry from Georgian Court College. and continued her studies with a teaching assistantship at the University of Notre Dame, IN. There she was awarded a MS degree in chemistry and a PhD degree in inorganic and physical chemistry with a fellowship from the Atomic Energy Commission . She was the only woman permitted to study on the campus at that time. Sister Mary Peter had an extraordinary career in teaching, research and lecturing at Georgian Court College, Lakewood, NJ. She was a member of the American Chemical Society, The National Science Teachers Assoc., Institute of Chemists, American Assoc of University Professors and the Mercy Higher Ed Society. She also chaired National Science Foundation task forces and served on the Board of Trustees of the Ocean County Chapter of the American Chemical Society. She received grants for over $400,000.00 and was able to equip the chemistry labs for a new science wing at Georgian Court College. Her colleagues and students called her a phenomenally good teacher, one who encouraged her students to excel. She was a devoted member of the Sisters of Mercy for 80 years. She is survived by many nieces, nephews, grand and great grand nieces and nephews and many Sisters of Mercy. Visitation will take place at McAuley Hall Health Care Center, Saint Catherine of Siena Chapel on Friday, January18, 2013 from 9:30 to 11:00 am followed by a Mass of Christian Burial at 11:00 am. Interment will be in Holy Redeemer Cemetery, South Plainfield, NJ Memorial Contributions may be made to Sisters of Mercy, Mid-Atlantic Community, Mount Saint Mary, 1645 Highway 22, Watchung, NJ 07069 Arrangements by Higgins Funeral Home, Watchung, NJ

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Would any of you who has a bit of news you'd like to share send it on to me at:

mairsie69@gmail.com ; or

 

Maryanne Hartigan Schrank

145 South Pine Avenue

Albany, NY 12208 ; or

 

518-466-3977 ?

I promise I'll get this thing going again. Pictures welcome. I can deal with them.

 

I'll start the ball rolling... had all my teeth removed 12/18/2012. Teeth were fine... gums had to be removed! Hadn't felt old til then. Now I've ordered a cane and a hospital bed ... at least virtually... Last evening I went to hear Rosalie Riegle of THE CATHOLIC WORKER movement speak on her two new books about activists who have been willing to be arrested and do prison time for the cause of peace. One of the subjects is a friend of mine and was present, a local lawyer, and three of the others, I've had a drink with in the 70s, the Berrigan brothers and Elizabeth McAllister. One wonders if we've come very far at all. Sunday I attended a talk by Roy Bourgeois, a former Maryknoll priest who has been excommunicated by the Pope for ordaining women. The event couldn't have been more perfectly planned if the organizers had been tipped off about B XVI's resignation! The church that hosted was so jammed we could hardly breathe. If you read about me being arrested, send salt-free soups. It will be because I am very active in THE NEW SANCTUARY FOR IMMIGRANTS movement. We're giving hostel to undocumented persons and trying to advocate for them or at least assist their families if, in fact, deportation does result. In between, I volunteer on THE HOMELESS ACTION VAN and we do have a major homeless problem here... men...  women ... lots of them veterans ... families, many evicted from substandard housing owned by "subhuman" landlords. Once a year I sleep out in the park to benefit the homeless. The event occurs whether there is mild weather or rain, snow, wind, hail... whatever. Only one night. I cannot imagine being Mary, a woman who sleeps out every night of the year.

 

THERE..... send me your item(s) ... I know Peggy Blank has moved and I think acquired a new grandchild. Kath has a b-day today I follow soon. Mary Costa makes the most gorgeous photographic images. Who knew? Let's share... Nothing says you have to be a member of the class of 1959!

Love to all.....

Maryanne






Autumn In Albany...Pshaw!!!

This is how it goes... you wake up in the morning and peek out to see a slit of sun. Ah-h-h, a nice day! But by the time you get downstairs, the sun is gone and the grayness has taken over. See ya at the end of April, Sun! We have the 5th least amount of available sunlight of large cities in the US ... ahead of us: Seattle, Portland, Buffalo, Syracuse.
Had a surprise visit from Kath and Charlie who came up to watch their granddaughter, Phoebe, play a high school tennis match. The heavens opened and the match was rained out when Phoebe was winning by a lot but we had a fun dinner and breakfast.
Kath and Charlie have returned to Florida for the winter. They'll take a short detour to India and Nepal to visit daughter Marya and family for the holidays.

I'm sure you'll enjoy, as I have this wonderful picture of Kath and Charlie with their son and four daughters, inlaws and many gorgeous grandchildren... taken on Cuddyhunk where they celebrated theur 50th wedding anniversaty!



COLUMBUS DAY 2010...

...and an appropriate time for my own voyage of discovery. I think the preceding extended rave/rant of 6/6/2009-7/?/2009, when finally sent yesterday did not reach its intended victims: the illustrious, and ever-patient with me, CLASS OF 1959 at GEORGIAN COURT UNIVERSITY, LAKEWOOD, JERSEY.

I know the web album did arrive because I've heard from Ann O'Neil. But if I'm ever to master the "blogging world", I'd better get some of the books off the shelf... and read. For today, however, it's NEW ENGLAND CLAM CHOWDER, or "chowdah", as Kath would say ... perhaps quite properly. Why did I buy clams when I yearned for the stuff when I could have gone to FRIENDLY'S?

Oh, well, the New England cookbooks are out...so they'll be dusted.... and away we go... why does every cookbook author have "....'s Famous Chowder"?





That's it. I'm avoiding getting the sand out...

Mairsie

The O-O-Ooops Page

Fast forward to October 10 2010 ... you're reading that correctly, dear mates... 2010, 2009! I shall not even begin to make excuses for my tardiness ... suffice it to say it is not laziness... I make too many promises ... and underdeliver! That is probably the long and the short of it.

I've been trying to create a new web papge for my business life for well over a year also and these "TO DO" lists hang over me like the sword of Damocles! Since I had really just about finished the text and the addition of the letters and pictures sent by our class members who could not attend, I can press SEND and off it goes. The frustraing part is that you will have to read from the bottom up ... that's the way of BLOGS... isn't it? ... mostly young people who want everyone on the planet to know how they FE-E-E-E-L at every given moment of their lives! So it is not burdensome to read up... a sentence, a paragraph, or three. You will have to indulge me... But I do promise that if you have news to send I shall keep it up and add to it... a paragraph or three at a time ...

Now a bit of housekeeping... does anyone see Josephine? Or know if her husband has access to e-mail? If he doesn't I guess I can print this out....

I know that somewhere I have Doree's e-mail but not at hand, so if someone has, could she forward it?

I haven't Mary Theresa's or Betty Master's.

When I was going through the GCU DIRECTORY ... I used it for e-mails because not all my 50th anniversary material followed me when my computer crashed in June ... I think I saw a little cross next to gloria ferrer's name. Add to the list of R.I.P.'s

All of CESAR's wonderful pictures I have put in a web album. I shall e-mail them to you ... they default to 3 seconds but you can click to 4-5 or more. You may add pictures, comment, send pictures to me to add... whatever you choose to do.

I hope this whets evryone's appetite to attend our 55th!

You will see I put up with a bad 18 months and finally came to white hair so Kath and I are now truly the Bobbsey twins.

I can give you an update on her! She and Charlie came to Albany last Monday to see granddaughter Phoebe play in a tennis match. Phoebe was scraping up the court with her opponent when the heavens opened and we all headed to higher ground ... for 4 days... but Kath, Charlie, and I had a lovely evening, dinner chez moi, and the sort of laughs and tears and reminiscences that 55 years of loving friendship begun in St Joseph's Hall have made possible!

Love to you all... if I still have my marbles in 2014, I'll outsource the BLOG so you'll have it in due time!

Maryanne

AnaCesar

DottieD

GETTING THERE

Friday..and finally we're off ... late...later...latest. Ana and Cesar were due to land at Newark Airport at 3:45 p.m.; I'd wanted to be at GCU about when they arrived but the heavens opened, traffic became worse and worse and I knew if I drove any faster we'd hydroplane, so.... Then we hit Newark and it was dead stop. Both the SIUs and ELLEN MULLANE GALLAGHER (1964) and her husband, who flew in from Minneapolis, reported that it took over an hour to get from the airport entrance to the Parkway!

Finally, LAKEWOOD through the fog. The Seventh St. Gate is no longer open. We entered near the CASINO and ARTS AND SCIENCE BUILDING and a lighted sign proclaimed

WELCOME HOME!

Seeing that, I felt wonderful! Kath and I quickly unloaded our stuff in the newest dorm ... St. Catherine's Hall where we each had a single room separated by a bathroom. How luxe! Little gifts awaited us here and there: Tee shirts, beach towels with the GCU logo, framed pictures of the Apollo fountain.... all the lovely Mercy touches!
We set out for the Casino and the opening cocktail buffet. In true Sisters of Mercy fashion, the lily was gilded! The silver was polished, china out, Mansion looks better than ever. Sister Rosemary, our President, greeted us and said that ANA and CESAR had arrived only minutes before - so their one or two hour trip from Newark had turned into four+ hours! They hadn't even checked into the rooms!

It's probably as good a time as any to give CESAR SIU thunderous applause for the majority of pictures in this BLOG. Some are mine but I had the worst attack of fibromyalgia in at least a year so missed ALL the campus tours which you'll see later through Cesar's lens. He's magnificent. Ana chose well!

Back to Friday night... the buffet was elegant... food more than anyone could even sample and the desserts beyond description! Chocolate macaroons, with white chocolate "skirts" remain in my memory as one of the real highlights of the weekend ... if not of my life. I'm still seeking a recipe on GOOGLE! But we four were tired from our journeys and I had work to do in the morning with my little picture display so off to the dorm we took ourselves at a very reasonable hour.

Fve years does make a difference in age. The Class of 1964 hooted and hollered long into the night. It's only by their admission that I say that; the dorm is totally soundproof and we didn't hear a thing!

A continental breakfast in the lounge made it easy to have a relaxing morning. Kathy, Ana and Cesar took off for a tour of the campus ... it was a glorious day- Saturday, June 6, the very date on which we, the Class of 1959 had graduated on another cloudless Saturday!

In the lower left picture you might see Kath looking fondly at the St Joe's balcony where we quite possibly had a cigarette or two... but then again we might not have, being obedient. We were known to slip down and peek to see if ARLENE SCHICKER'S "chuck wagon", brought every Sunday night from home, looked bursting! Arlene never gained a pound ... probably why her parents loaded up the ottoman... but we all did! The "freshman 15" and more, I daresay!


The REUNION LUNCHEON for classes ending in "4" and "9" was the main event ... held in the impressive new WELLNESS CENTER complex . What a remarkable building and environment this is ... "green" inside and out and designed to carry Georgian Court's mission of educating the whole person into the 21st century and beyond. The link below from publicity at its opening in Autumn 20098 describes the WELLNESS CENTER far better than I could.

http://www.georgian.edu/news_releases/080807_wellness_center_opening.htm

It was here that Kathy, Ana, Cesar and I joined with all our classmates who attended our 50th REUNION: MARY ELLIN PRICE BOLLINGER, MARY COSTA, PAT STEINER HUNT, DOTTIE D'ANNUNZIO MONGELLI , ROSEMARIE GALLINA, PEGGY BLANK MURPHY, LYNN AAGARD SCHELL, ANN O'NEILL BACON, ARLENE SCHICKER,

and TRUDY SZILAGY DI FRANCESCO.

It could only have been happier if more of us had been there but we raised our glasses to everyones' health and well-being! The luncheon was formal... classes sitting together ... we older folks were toward the front of the massive gymnasium ... I suppose partially pride of age and place ... maybe consideration of possible hearing difficulties, eh???


I had the great honor of introducing the anniversary classes... there was one member of the Class of 1939, a couple from 1940 and 1941 ... looking great...beautiful, spry, happy.. I might add! I need Mary Teresa for the math but I think it will be our year in 2029. Shall we shoot for that? Let's! I think Cesar got a picture of that group pf Courtiers! Stay tuned!

THE LUNCH BUNCH

At the luncheon Cynthia announced that our class tied for first place in donations to GCU to honor the Reunion. The tie occurred because a faithful alumna, from an earlier class, had died and left a considerable sum of money to the university. So THREE CHEERS FOR US!

At one of the 1959 tables we were honored to have GCU's Provost, Dr. Joseph Gower, join us. Rosemarie Gallina had met with him and they are attempting to establish an exchange program with a university in Italy where Rosemarie has contacts. Following lunch, Dr.Gower invited us to join him on a tour of the WELLNESS CENTER. During a rest stop in one of the comfortably appointed classrooms, he spoke of the many areas into which GCU is expanding. ...truly exciting, innovative and practical!