Quincy University - Gyrfalcon Yearbook (Quincy, IL)

Page 99 text:

Franciscan Centennial Observance . . . The solemn commemoration of the 100th anni- versary of the coming of the brown-robed Franciscans to the Middlewest was celebrated at Quincy College on October fourth, fifth, and sixth, 1958. His Excellency, the Most Rev. Albert R. Zuro- weste, Bishop of Belleville, Illinois diocese and a Quincy College alumnus, offered the centennial Pon- tifical High Mass on Oct. 5, 1958, for the local clergy and religious. In a dinner address later in the day, Bishop Zuroweste touchingly commented that some of the tenderest and most blessed memories of my life go back to my days at St. Francis Solanus College where I first came as a boy of 13 in 1914. The times have changed but the spirit of the friars hasn ' t changed. The Most Rev. Augustine Sepinski, O.F.M., Minister Gen- eral of the entire Franciscan Order greets the Very Rev. Pius Barth, O.F.M., Minister Provincial of the St. Louis- Chicago Province in Rome, where they discussed centennial plans. In answer to an appeal for priests from Bishop Damian Juncker of Alton, Illinois, Father Provincial Gregory Janknecht of Warendorf, Germany, sent nine friars who landed at New York harbor on September 14, 1858. It was the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. By December, 1858, the pioneer friars moved into a newly built friary at Teutopolis, Illinois, situated a hundred miles east of St. Louis. Two years later a novitiate house was built, and by 1862 the fathers opened St. Joseph College at Teutopolis, though the Civil War made such a college seem inoppor- tune. Almost immediately after arriving from Germany the fathers opened St. Francis Solanus College (now Quincy College) in 1860 — the oldest Catholic Col- lege in Illinois. 95

Page 98 text:

Homecoming queen is flanked by attendants, Donna Moorhead and Mickey Mason with Kappa Mu Sigma honorguard.

Page 100 text:

Father Owen Blum, O.F.M., professor o f History reviewed the accomplishments of the Franciscans in the last century during a solemn High Mass cele- brated by the Most Reverend Pius Barth, O.F.M., in St. Francis Church. He told a crowded congregation that in the sec- ond century we must spread our efforts to even higher horizons. No prophet could have seen how the small labor of a few pioneers would have grown to apos- tolic labor in twenty-one dioceses and fourteen states. The essential blessing that we have received from the friars is a gem of great price, our Faith, but the inheritance that we received one hundred years ago can be squandered — so our greater task is to the generations yet to come. Father Paul Reinert, S.J., president of St. Louis Univer- sity was guest speaker for the first fall faculty meeting and commented on the centennial observance. In 1873 Quincy College received a legal charter from the state of Illinois, permitting it to confer aca- demic degrees. The college was later officially recog- nized by the University of Illinois, affiliated to the Catholic University of America, and fully accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. Father Julian Woods, O.F.M., president, receives the 1959 Illinois license plates from State Secretary Charles Carpen- tier. State representative, Henry Ihnen may be seen in the center. This year ' s plates are in honor of Quincy College and bear the school ' s traditional colors, brown and white. 96