Ten Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet served as nurses during the Spanish American War. This photo, which includes hospitalized soldiers, was taken at a military hospital in Matanzas, Cuba.
Two nurses and two doctors demonstrate the use of a pulmotor on a patient at St. Joseph's Hospital. The hospital was established by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet during a cholera epidemic in 1853.
Helen Kramer and Lydia Kost pose for an advertisement of the opening of the School of Nursing at St. Raphael's Hospital (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives).
Building at the far left is the former first hospital (St. Benedict's) converted to the nursing school. In 1928, when St. Raphael's Hospital was no longer adequate, the sisters built their fourth hospital in St. Cloud, named St. Cloud Hospital; the School of Nursing was moved to that new site. St. Raphael's Hospital was then converted to a home for the elderly, known as St. Raphael's Rest Home; later it became a retirement center for the Sisters of St. Benedict. Then in 1999, it was purchased by a private organization to serve as a shelter for the poor and homeless called "Place of Hope" (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives).
Miss Wilma Johnson, a superintendent of nurses from Chicago, was engaged by the Sisters of St. Benedict to serve as the first director of the St. Raphael's School of Nursing in St. Cloud from 1908 to 1910 (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives, McDonald, page 258).
The nursing students of 1921 at St. Raphael's Hospital are shown in this photo with the ten Sister-nurses of the school's staff in row two identified from left to right: Sisters (1) Herberta Klein, (2) Cunegund Kuefler, (3) Borgia Knelleken, (4) Leobina Gliszhinski, (5) Julitta Hoppe, (6) Serena Bold, (8) Elizabeth Von Drehle, (9) Melitta Hoffman and (10) Ladislaus Twardowski.
Frank Karn transferred from employment from Saint Benedict's Convent to St. Cloud Hospital when it opened in 1928 and stayed on for 45 years. He was a registered engineer.
Because Sister Borgia was willing to take on any task asked of her, she responded to Dr. Page E. Stangl's (pathologist) request to help him set up a laboratory of animals for research. She called herself the zoo-keeper and worked with this project in her quiet, unassuming way for 39 years--first in crowded conditions among the offices on 6th floor of the hospital and then in the seclusion of the sub-basement.