Nun so fair

It's too bad that becoming a nun detached a person from her birth family and attached her to a convent family. She was given a new unrelated name, and her family name seemed to be re-attached only when she died.
In my parents' families, we have Sr Laura OSB, Sr Teresita OSB, Sr Severine OSB, Sr Kunigunda OSF, and Sr Lazara OSF.

Just so it's recorded somewhere:

Sr Teresita was Anna Sand (daughter of Mike Sand & Louisa Rausch)...she was the skinny, small one, with a great sense of humor and most often a coif that was askew (left in picture)...lol

Sr Severine (middle in picture)was originally Mary Sand (daughter of Mike Sand & Louisa Rausch)...she was built more like Grandma, and looked like her too.

Sr Laura (on right in the picture) started life as Theresa Hesch (daughter of Paul Hesch & Mary Otremba)...lots about her elsewhere on Hesch History.

Sr Kunigunda was mom's aunt Anna Janson (daughter of Joseph Janson and Franziska Fuchs)...did we kids ever meet these two sisters? The Franciscan order took the "poverty" vow seriously, so when mom sent them pictures of us, they weren't allowed to keep them. In a few days, a letter would arrive full of holy cards...and the pictures.

Sr Lazara was another aunt, Sophia Janson (daughter of Joseph Janson & Franziska Fuchs)...Sr Lazara was wheelchair bound in later life. I think this photo was from c 1935-40.

Click SISTERS for a link to other pictures from the Milwaukee Convent.

Evidently, there was no standard way to record teaching nuns on censuses--a school convent with a few nuns would sometimes be just their religious names, not even "Sr.", and other years, it might be "Severine Sand", so it's impossible to trace them unless you know where they were stationed, in what years. And now, even their own mother houses don't list them, at least not online....but how hard would that be?

(36 days)