Happy New Year Classmates!

May God Bless each and everyone of you!

S.F.X.A History Lesson

In this picture, the Cobb House still has its third story, which was later removed.  The 1860 neighborhood was prominent - the Crumps next door (where auditorium is), the Balfours and the Willises (Newitt Vick's niece, Martha Patience Vick Willis) across the street.  If you notice, there are no front steps to the Cobb House. That is because the neighbors did not want to see the poor children the nuns were teaching, so the steps were removed and tall hedges planted across the front. The children entered from the back.  The Cobb House was built in the early 1830's, the Gothic Convent was built in 1868, and the Italianate auditorium was build in 1885.  As most of you know, the last scenes of "Oh Brother Where Art Thou" with George Clooney were filmed in the auditorium.

Mississippi

In 1860, the Sisters founded the
very first school in Vicksburg,
St. Francis Xavier Academy.

In late 1860, six Sisters of Mercy, led by Sister Mary DeSales Browne, traveled half-way across the country from Baltimore to a tiny river city called Vicksburg, located near the border of Mississippi and Louisiana. Father F. X. Leray had called on them to educate the children of the city, who had no access to education – not even a public school. The Sisters opened the town’s first school less than a week after arriving.

Nearly two years later, the school was shuttered as Sisters and families fled into the hills to avoid the cannon fire of the Civil War. After about a month, the Sisters returned to find their former school filled with sick and injured soldiers. They immediately began providing nursing care. During the heaviest battles, the injured were removed to areas of safety and the Sisters accompanied them to continue their care.

In 1864, Mother Mary DeSales Browne returned to Vicksburg and reopened the school with 200 students and only four Sisters.

In 1878, when a particularly harsh epidemic of yellow fever broke out in Vicksburg, Mother Mary DeSales Browne took over City Hospital, where the Sisters nursed as many as 300 patients a day.

In 1943, the Sisters assumed operations of a hospital, which they renamed Mercy Hospital. During their 48 years of service, it was designated a Regional Pediatric Polio Center and treated victims of numerous natural disasters. The Sisters served there until 1991, when Mercy sold the hospital to Quorum Health Care.

Today Mercy ministers in Mississippi through the Mississippi Health Advocacy Program (MHAP) in Jackson, Mississippi. MHAP was started in 1992, at the urging of Sister Cyrena Harkins, RSM, to be a collaborative effort aimed at improving health policies, practices and funding in Mississippi, especially for the poor and needy.

Merry Christmas Classmates!

Wishing all my Classmates a very Merry Christmas 

from my home to yours!

God Bless You!

~Marian Love Phillips~

Remember When....

The 23rd Psalm

Going Down Memory Lane @ SFXA

Getting ready to climb the stairs to high school.  

Went up and down these steps many times.

On Friday, November 6, 2015, I attended the last of the Classics in the Courtyard at the Southern Cultural Heritage Foundation, formally our old Alma Mater.  Afterwards, I went upstairs to our high school and took a lot of pictures. It was so overwhelming coming back to where I spent the last four years of high school.  It was an awesome experience for sure. This is for all my classmates and former classmates to go down memory lane again with me.  I have posted close to 50 pictures for my classmates to see and it's hard to believe that it has been 56 years since we graduated. Thanks for the memories!

Almost there.

Made it!

Water fountain.

Bathroom

Looking back towards the staircase I came up.

Looking down an empty hallway that we all walked many years ago.

Sewing Room

9th Grade Classroom

Needing a lot of repair work.

Typing room.

10th Grade Classroom

Where The Maryon was assembled and published.

Library

Walking out the doorway to 11th Grade Classroom.

11th Grade Classroom

Intercom System

Staircase to downstairs.

12th Grade Classroom

I never noticed this shelf before.

Downstairs to the Auditorium

Windows near the staircase.

Looking out the window at the Balfour House directly across on Crawford Street.

Pemberton's Headquarters on Crawford Street.

Within a week after commencement of the siege of Vicksburg, Lieutenant General John C. Pemberton selected one of the city's finest mansions to house his headquarters operations for the defending Confederate forces.

Looking back down the hall from the 12th Grade classroom with a flood of memories.

One more look at the library and wishing the walls could talk!

Some type of intercom system.

Coming back downstairs to leave, I notice a new doorway/wall which was put in because the hallway was opened up when attending school in elementary and high school.  

Front of Auditorium/High School upstairs standing at the Balfour House.

Cross on top of our old Alma Mater ~ S.F.X.A.

Concrete blocks that held wooden seats to sit on at the big playground.

Picture of our old Alma Mater from the parking lot.

St. Xavier Dear

St. Xavier dear, we'll think of thee

When classroom days have passed away

Those happy days to us will be

A bond of love when far away.

Chorus

St. Xavier dear, St. Xavier dear,

You colors rare of blue and white

Will always be as dear to me

As on this happy night.

Your daughters, too, are always true,

Oh Alma Mater fair;

A hymn of praise for you they raise

For you their love declare.

We love thy halls, St. Xavier dear

The friends we've made there long ago

They come again in visions clear

To grace the scenes we use to know.