Sister Mary Lucina was a petite Irish nun who taught Latin with the Sisters of Charity at the Catholic, all-girls school, Presentation Academy. The Academy complex was located on the corner of Fourth and Breckinridge Streets in downtown Louisville, Kentucky.
She was born in Boston and on Saint Patrick’s Day we girls could count on skipping half our class session by singing Irish songs, but my first remembrance of her was quite frightening for a brand-new freshman.
Sister Mary Lucina strode into the second-period room with the presence of a Brigadier General intent on inflicting great harm on green freshmen seated before her. She stepped up onto the platform that held her desk and with a flourish that swirled the top of her black cloak behind her arm, arced that arm to cast down a pointed finger at a trembling student in the second row.
“Translate!” she demanded in a tone that quickly straightened the spines of her new students.
All of those students with the exception of Jeanie Gish received a 61 on our first marking period. Jeannie received a high grade. Perhaps she was destined to become a Sister of Charity from that day onward.
Over the school years, I grew very fond of Sister Mary Lucina. Her nickname for me was “Jerimiah”. For many years after graduation, we corresponded with me telling her of my life’s progress.
Sister James Francis was the reason that when I became an art teacher, I would never touch a student’s painting to correct it. I insisted that they could do it themselves.
It began when Aunt Frances and Uncle George took the Kernen girls along with their cousin Bo, on a trip to the Smokey Mountains. We stopped to visit Cumberland Falls and I was awestruck by the beauty of the area. So later when instructed in art class to paint something I thought remarkable, I chose the Falls and the area around it and painted green trees reflected in the water flowing beneath the cascading waterfall.
Viewing my canvas, Sister James Frances admonished my work saying, “Water is not green! It’s blue!” Taking my brush in her hand she scooped up a blob of blue paint and stroked it onto my flowing stream.I was never able to recapture the spirit of my green reflections and I told myself that if ever I had the opportunity of teaching someone to paint, I would never inflict such canvas pain on another human being.
As graduation neared, Sister James Frances spoke to me of her great displeasure that during my years at the Academy, I had decreased her large roll of silver paper from a huge size down to only one-third of its original width. When I reminded her that none of the silver paper had been used for my personal benefit but had been for decorating plays, dances, and other school events, she changed the subject.
After decorating the ballroom for our Senior Prom, I recall sweating and leaving the building just as my fellow students, dressed in their pretty prom gowns were beginning to enter for the occasion. I returned later in my own gown, to enjoy looking around at the last of the silver paper that I would ever cut from that roll.
I did not score well on typing exams and was told by my teacher, “You will never get a job typing!” When I began working as a writer for WAVE-TV, I was proud to tell her at a class reunion, “Sister, the announcers can read it!”