The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1936-05-27
Our
Town
ANTON sCHERRER

| AN1ON SOnEhhEh
MAYBE you've noticed the nice
A'A nun in the middle aisle of the
City Market, but maybe your eyes
haven't wandered down far enough
to know that she sells the kind of
aprons made by the Sisters of the
Good Shepherd.
Besides making aprons. the nuns
in Raymond-st do a number OF
other nice things, too. They fix all
the monograms on the shirts sold
by the L. Strauss people and they
make some of the loveliest laces you
ever laid your eyes on.
Most of their business is on
ister-to-customer basis, but
sometimes. especially around Christ
mas, they let some of the stores sell
their wares. And to keep their time
fully occupied, they run a steam
laundry.
Some of the luckiest trousseaux
ever turned out for Indianapolis
brides were made by them. Given a
fair start, a nun-made trousseau is
luckier than any other kind. At any
rate, Edith Vonnegut and Erna
Rhoads still like to look at their
made things, which is more
than you can say for most trous-
seaux.
THE indianapolis unit of the
n House of the Good Shepherd
was founded in 1873, but it really got
started II years before that. The
story of the start is one of the
strangest in the towns archives be-
cause, believe it or not, the House !
was started without the nuns know
ing anything about it. A couple of
men were at the bottom of it.
The institution was an outgrowth
of the Civil War. The floating
population living by plumber and
chance upon the soldiers brought
plague of loose women to Indianap-
oils and it became so bad in 1862
that Mayor Caven called the atten-
ton of the council to it.
The Jail couldn't hold the women
any more and so the Mayor sug-
gested building house of refuge
for them. Nothing came of it at
the time.
A year later, however, Stoughton
A. Fletcher made a proposition to
give seven acres of ground just
south of the city between the Bluff
and the Three Notch roads for a
reformatory if the city would do it's
part and put up building.
The gift was accepted and $4,000
appropriated for the purpose. Plans
were accepted and contracts let.
The prices advanced SO greatly un-
der the influence of the war that
the work was stopped in 1864 after
$4,000 was spent. All they had to
show for it was fine stone base
ment.
NOTHING happened to the fine
L Y stone basement until Father
Bessonies Of st. Johns got around
to it. Father Bessonies had watched
the building of the basement be-
cause it was near some land ne had
purchased.
Father Bessonies' land turned out
to be Holy Gross Cemetery and it
just about broke him because he
paid for it out of his own pocket.
But broke as he was, Father Bes-
sonies wanted to do something about
the wasted basement.
The more he thought of the for
lorn basement, the more he thought
of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, |
a clustered order back in his be-
loved France who for 200 years and
more had been doing what Mayor
Caven had in mind.
Father Bessonies and Mayor Cav
en- struck bargain and nobody to
this day knows who got the better
of the deal. BY the terms of the
bargain the Sisters of the Good
Shepherd got the basement and land
for nothing and Indianapolis got a
shelter for girls who want to go
straight.
Which accounts for the nice nun
in the City Market.