“Quite a tale when you think about it”
Catholic San Francisco visited the elder care residence Alma Via of San Francisco to meet with residents for an article about how the economic downturn is affecting the elderly. The residents downplayed that idea right off the top: they saw no comparison between the severity of the current recession and the Great Depression. In the 1930s, they recalled, people experienced true want and fear. Do today's newspapers carry pictures of men jumping off buildings? Do children of the 2009 recession go to the corner store to pick up 10 cents worth of vegetable trimmings and soup bones for supper? The residents saw nothing to compare with such scenes today. A different story emerged over two visits as the residents, ranging in age from their mid 80s to almost 100, opened up with reflections on long and happy lives. Some painted word pictures of growing up in immigrant families in San Francisco and the central role Catholic parish life played in their upbringing. "The Church," native San Franciscan Bernardine Washburn said, "came first for everything."
Here, as part of Catholic San Francisco's latest issue of Senior Living, Bernardine and three other Alma Via residents - Claire Sullivan, Mario Conti and Betty Feeley - reflect on their lives in their own words.
BERNARDINE. BORN AUG. 20, 1915.
"My grandmother and grandfather, Mary and John Tierney, were born in Northern Ireland. They were Catholic, so they couldn't get jobs. They finally came to America and settled in the Potrero, where he had an uncle. They were advertising for work - they wanted miners on the eastern slope of Mt. Diablo. He became a coal miner.
"My mother always talked about what a beautiful place it was. She always talked about the beautiful rolling hills.
"There was one man who had a horse and buggy and he would go to Antioch every Saturday to shop and the wives would always have something for him to buy like a bolt of gingham to make dresses, and anything that was left was to buy candy for the children."
When Bernardine was growing up her mother would take her and her two sisters on trips to the mining camp called Somersville, by then a ghost town. She would point out where the boys lived.
"She always longed to see the hills of Somersville. She would see a pepper tree and she would know who lived in that house because the midwife would plant a pepper tree every time she birthed a baby. I think it was a beautiful time for her.
"Her father died of black lung from the coal. And the mother got a $345 death benefit and she bought the house on Santa Marina Street. That's where we lived. We went to school at St. Paul's, which was a good long walk for us. Years passed, and here I am."
The family had a pew at St. Paul Church. In those days every family had a pew with its name on it. "Very important." Her father, a convert, was a head usher who grew to deeply admire the pastor, Father Michael David Connolly and help care for the priest in his old age.
"When you bought a new pair of shoes you didn't wear them until you went to church. Black patent leather shoes. Church came first. On Sunday morning, we lined up in the kitchen and my father told us how to behave at church, and then you put your hand out and he gave us 10 cents - two nickels, one was for church and one was for the hokey pokey man, the ice cream man on Sunday. He had a horse and wagon. Church came first for everything."
All three siblings are living. They are 95, 93, and 91. The eldest, Sister Rosemary Sage, is a Sister of Charity living at the motherhouse in Dubuque, Iowa.
"I think they were nervous about having three daughters to they were pretty strict. If you were late coming home they would say, ‘Where have you been, you could have been all the way to Milpitas?' And we'd say, ‘Where the heck is Milpitas?' And the years just rolled by and you wonder where they went, but I had a full life like all of you."
Bernardine had a 50-year career as a nurse. She and her husband adopted a son.
"My little boy is 62 and he just told me the other day he put in for Social Security. So life goes on."
MARIO. BORN NOV. 15, 1921.
"My younger days were at St. Anthony's (then a Franciscan parish) on Army Street. I went to school there. I remember the tuition was a dollar a month. I spent quite a bit of time in the church. From the sixth grade on I helped out in the sacristy, helping brother out mostly. It got to the point where if brother had to take some time off I'd go up and ring the bells for the Angelus at noon and 6 o'clock."
St. Anthony in those days had one main bell that rang only on feast days.
"One of the big things we liked to do was get on it and ride the rope up and down. It took a while to get it going but once we got it going we'd ride it up.
"There were two other bells that were rung before Mass and then there was another bell for the Angelus at 6, noon and 6 at night. You'd do the clapper three times and then the final bell would ring.
"It was a German national parish. St. Boniface was the original German national parish and then a group formed St. Anthony. The nuns were Dominicans of Mission San Jose. Things were pretty strict. You just didn't get out of line.
Bernardine: "I used to stop there on my way to work to light a candle. There were candles in the whole church.
Mario: "One of the things I used to do was set up the candles."
The inscriptions on the Stations of the Cross were in German. Mario said all his prayers in German but has forgotten them now.
"Those were days when there wasn't too much worry about stuff except of course making ends meet, but that was my parents' problem!"
The Contis, Mario and Louise, took in 100 foster children over 30 years.
"Louise liked to take care of the newborns. We used to get them from St. Elizabeth's home for unwed mothers. I learned how to change old-fashion diapers. You just had the square cloth and had to make a diaper. And then after you get all done he looks up at you and he's got a grin and you know darn well..."
BETTY. BORN JAN. 24, 1925.
Betty's family's parish was Blessed Sacrament in Elmhurst, Queens, New York.
"No matter where you lived you walked to school and went home for lunch. I envied the kids who went home for lunch - they were the rich kids. My brother went to Manhattan to school with the Christian Brothers and I went to Cathedral High School on Lexington Avenue. We had Dominican nuns, Ursuline order.
"Unfortunately my school is gone now. It was condemned, it was so old. I graduated from St. Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan. I met my husband after the war. He was transferred to California. We belonged to Our Lady of Mercy in Westlake, then we came to Our Lady of Angels, then I came to Alma Via.
Betty said the best things about being 84 are having grandchildren and making new friends.
"The worst thing is I don't drive anymore, which I miss terribly. And I don't have my home. That I miss very much."
CLAIRE. BORN MAY 16, 1910. Her grandfather, Jerry Sullivan, came from Boston.
"Because in Boston they said no Catholics need apply for jobs. So he worked for a contractor and he had nine children, and he was all for education, education, education. That was how you got ahead. And he did all the draying when they were planting Golden Gate Park. Three of the boys became attorneys, two of the girls became teachers. Even when I was growing up he said, ‘You study hard because that's how to get ahead.'"
Both sides of her family originally came from Ireland.
"Because the English wouldn't let them own anything. If you were Catholic in Ireland you were treated like you were a second-class citizen. So they figured the best thing was to leave. So they came as young men but they did have an advantage - they could speak the language. It maybe wasn't the best English because they had a different brogue from a different section of Ireland but at least they had that and they got a job right away.
"And then my grandmother when she came at 16 the only thing that was open to them was to work in a home as a helper or a maid. So she worked in this home. He was a professor of German at one of the universities, and he had two daughters. My grandmother was very bright. Whenever he taught he'd have my grandmother sit in so she would get the advantage of the education he was giving his girls. They were wonderful to her. They knew that education was the key to everything.
"My mother told me that story a million times to let me know they made great sacrifices for their children to get ahead.
The story of the Sullivans is, Claire mused, "quite a tale when you think about it."
Claire worked as a hospital administrator for the Sisters of Mercy for almost 20 years.
"I never went to work in the morning where I felt, ‘Oh, I have to go to work.' I always looked forward to what the day was going to bring. So, yeah, it was a good life.
"I guess I haven't changed much because I never let things bother me too much. I'm a great reader. I always have something interesting in the room. I have my music. I have TV, my books. If I want to be social I can be social but if I don't want to be I don't have to be. So it doesn't get any better than that."
By Rick Del Vecchio
From May 15, 2009 issue of Catholic San Francisco.
