Selma, Alabama Collection, Sisters of St. Joseph Archive, Rochester, NY

December 15, 2020

This week’s Hidden Catholic Collection is the Selma, Alabama Collection in the Sisters of St. Joseph Archive in Rochester, NY. It documents the Sisters’ service in Selma from 1940 to the present including work at Good Samaritan Hospital during 1965 voting rights marches.

The Selma Collection contains an extensive collection of photographs, news clippings, annals of the mission at St. Elizabeth’s Parish, records of the Good Samaritan Hospital, histories, correspondence, and oral histories. Congressman John Lewis ⁦(1940-2020) was treated at Good Samaritan Hospital after being beaten on Bloody Sunday, when Alabama police officers and county residents assaulted marchers. When Sisters took over Good Samaritan in 1944 for Edmundite Fathers, it was the only health care facility in the region that would accept Black patients. 

Contact:
Kathleen Urbanic
Congregational Archivist
Sisters of St. Joseph of Rochester
150 French Road
Rochester, NY  14618

[email protected]
(585) 641-8214

Facebook: @SistersofSaintJosephofRochester
Twitter: @SSJRochester

The Sisters of St. Joseph Archive offers a rich resource for exploring the Civil Rights Movement in Alabama. Here the Sisters are seen with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Selma, which they ran.
The finding aid for the Selma, Alabama Collection in the Sisters of St. Joseph Archive in Rochester, NY.
The finding aid for the Selma, Alabama Collection in the Sisters of St. Joseph Archive in Rochester, NY.
The finding aid for the Selma, Alabama Collection in the Sisters of St. Joseph Archive in Rochester, NY.