With Catholic School Week upon us, Chaminade Julienne Catholic High School takes the opportunity to spotlight religious sisters who came to be the first Catholic educators in Dayton. Their arrival in 1849, started 175 years of teaching while serving God at the corner Ludlow and Franklin in downtown Dayton.
The story of their arrival begins in 1849 when five pioneering women, members of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, had just arrived by canal boat from Cincinnati. At the time, the settlement of Dayton, Ohio had around 10,000 residents, with a growing population of German settlers who came to help dig the Ohio and Erie Canal. Emmanuel Catholic Church, the first Catholic church in the Dayton area, was established in 1837 to serve these Catholic German immigrants. Over the next 12 years, there became a growing need for a school with lessons taught in German as the number of families in the parish increased significantly.
The story behind the Sisters’ arrival in 1849 has an unexpected twist. It stemmed from a request for Emmanuel Church’s pastor for religious teachers to start the parish school, the first Catholic parochial school in Dayton. This amusing tale was originally written by Sister Vincent Fett, SNDdeN in Columbus bulletin, but was retold in Emmanuel Catholic Church’s Sesquicentennial History 1837-1987.
“It seems that both Emmanuel’s pastor, Father Henry Juncker, and a young priest in Columbus, Ohio requested the services of ‘black-robed ladies’ to teach in their parochial schools at the same time. Having only a limited supply of sisters to send to the schools, the Dutch-born Sister Superior Louise, sought the advice of Archbishop Purcell.”
The story continues, “Opting for the Columbus school, the archbishop hastily wrote: ‘Columbus not Dayton is to be begun first.’ Fortunately for Father Juncker, the Sister Superior’s mastery of English was incomplete, and she read the letter, ‘Columbus not, Dayton is to be begun first.’ Father Juncker received his teachers.”
Sister Superior Louise purchased a colonial mansion and property at the corner of Ludlow and Franklin Streets from the Valandigham family for $4,500 in August 1849, which turned the tides of this corner and began this property’s history dedicated to the good God. A month later, Sister Ignatia (superior), Sister Caesarine, Sister Mary Helene, Sister Mary Honorine, and Sister Chantal came to Dayton as the city recovered from a summer cholera outbreak. Since no railroad trains existed in Southwest Ohio, these five sisters arrived by canal boat on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross on September 14.
Following an exhausting two-day trip from Cincinnati, the sisters did not receive a warm welcome in Dayton. “The gentle and sweet-faced sisters who first taught in the old house created much of a sensation upon their arrival, and the lawless, bigoted element of the city gave them a welcome by stoning their residence during the first night and by threatening to burn the place,” according to a March 29, 1904 Dayton Daily News article. It was also reported in the community that the people initially feared and avoided the “black-robed ladies.”
Thankfully, the sisters’ good spirits won out, and public opinion quickly changed as the five plunged into their work, opening Emmanuel parish school for the children of the Catholic German settlers and orphans. The sisters staffed the Emmanuel School from 1849 until its closing a century later. During the early days in Dayton, money was tight, so the sisters had to rely on donations from the community for furniture and slept on the floor for the first month. With most of their income generated from Emmanuel Church’s penny collections, food and other supplies were often scarce during their first year.
From 1849 to 1926, the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur made the intersection of Ludlow and Franklin not only their home but also the cornerstone of Catholic education in Dayton. In addition to staffing the school at Emmanuel, the sisters sought to educate girls in their high school years. After several attempts, they opened the doors to sustained high school education, and on May 4, 1886, 21 young women walked through the doors and became the first students of Notre Dame Academy, the new all-girls high school at this corner. In 1886, this academy was the only private or faith-based educational option for girls who wanted to continue their education after elementary school.
From this corner, Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur would come to teach in 16 Dayton area schools, including: Emmanuel, Holy Trinity, St. Mary, Our Lady of the Rosary, St. John, Holy Angels, Holy Family, St. Agnes, St. James, St. Rita, Immaculate Conception, St. Helen, Ascension, Dayton Catholic and Carroll High School. 1 In 1886, Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur built Notre Dame Academy on Franklin Street. When enrollment increased, they built Julienne High School in North Dayton in 1927. Today, along with the Society of Mary, the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur have owned and operated Chaminade Julienne Catholic High School at the corner of Ludlow and Franklin Streets since the 1973-1974 school year.
In tribute to the early work of the sisters who persisted in establishing and sustaining Catholic education in Dayton, the Dayton Herald acknowledged in 1899, “The good women who have been identified with the academy in its history have done much in the way of education progress in Dayton.”
1 Archdiocese of Cincinnati website; [https://200.catholicaoc.org/communities/religious/sisters-of-notre-dame-de-namur]
Photo credit:
Title: “West Franklin Street from Ludlow”
Courtesy of Dayton Public Library, Dayton Remembers, Preserving the History of the Miami Valley: Lutzenberger Picture Collection. Photographer: Lutzenberger, William, 1853-1941, MS 024 0390
https://daytonremembers.org/digital/collection/lutzenberge/id/430/rec/2
Photo information: This is the mansion at the corner of Ludlow and Franklin Streets that Mother Superior Louise, SNDdeN purchased from the Vallandigham family so the five pioneering sisters could start the first Catholic elementary school in Dayton.
Additional historical information: This 1889 photo features the 10-foot wall that the sisters constructed around the property after the 1860 flood to “protect from further flooding.” (The 1913 flood destroyed it.) The building behind the mansion is a school building that the sisters constructed in 1876.