Mary Delong

In the late 1960s until at least 1976 it was standard practice for one of the priests to have dinner at the home of each First Communicant during his/her preparation year.


Mary Smuda

The school band practiced in the old boiler room in the church basement in the 1960s. Band practice was after lunch and students would walk down the covered driveway between the church and the rectory to a little door at the back, then head downstairs for a musical interlude before heading back to their classrooms.


Norb Gair; member from 1943-2005

In the mid-1960s the Holy Name Society did a fundraiser for the school which was a fashion show where all the men dressed up as women.  Since Jackie Kennedy and her pill box hats were all the rage at the time, they glued actual pill containers onto their hats so they could have the latest “pill box” hats too.


Teresa Gair Klingelhoets; worked in the rectory from 1969-1973

On Sunday mornings breakfast was served to the eight or so priests who presided at the Masses.  Teresa remembers cooking these to order.  She also remembers Fr. Stephen Adrian and Fr. John Malone chasing bats that had gotten in through the attic, running after them with tennis rackets as the bats flew down one staircase, into the kitchen, through the dining room and up another staircase.

Fr. Towey and Msgr. Donald Gormley kept cash under their mattresses to give to people in need.  One of them bought a young staff member a winter coat.  Msgr. Gormley also went to Murray’s Steak Restaurant where he would eat the side dishes, but bring home the steak for Fr. Frederick Mertz’s dog, Woofer.

One Easter vigil, when it began at midnight, there were so many altar boys that they       stretched out along the entire length of the Communion rail.  As they were kneeling there during the long readings that were part of the service, several of them starting falling asleep and falling backwards, hitting their heads on the hard floor.  Amazingly no one caught on fire from the candles they were holding!  But after that they stopped having the younger boys serve.

Fr. Nick Cody had an interesting way of disciplining an unruly boy in the school:  They would each put on boxing gloves and do a few rounds.  A few carefully placed punches by Fr. Cody no doubt kept the boy in line after that.

Matt Rieger

Serving as an altar boy during the late sixties was not only a tremendous honor, but also included the great altar boy picnics that were always a lot of fun. One particular altar boy picnic event really stands out. Father  Ralph Goman who was in charge of the altar boys had made arrangeents one year for all of the altar boys to go over to St. Thomas College for a swim for an hour and then out to Como Park for a picnic and fun in the sun. Our bus load of altar boys, fifty to sixty, arrived at St. Thomas for our swim. As we all filed into the swimming pool area, we were dismayed to see that there was not on drop of water inside the pool. Unfortunately, poor Father looked even more dismayed. It seems that somehow dates had gotten mixed up and the pool had been drained for repairs. So, everyone had to get back on to the bus to head to Como Park. The weather outside was not currently sunny and th picnic area with a shell covering had been reserved for us an hour later, after wer were supposed to have finished swimming. So even after a slow bus ride to Como Park, we arrived earlier than anticipated and our picnic area was still being used by a group of moms and young children. Well, you could not keep 50 to 60 altar boys cooped up on a parked bus for too long, so we finally got out and we just kind of moved the moms and kids out of our picnic area in a very nice way. Fifty to sixty altar boys have the ability to do that with a lot of charm!


We Come to Share Our Story                       page 2