What's New
June 2010
Mother Marianne Given Charge of Boys' Home at Kalawao
Following Father Damien's Death.
New Home Built During Franciscan Leadership Time
The Board of Ka’Ohana O Kalaupapa has been working with the National Parks Service (NPS) in identifying a location for a Memorial which will have the 8,000 names of the patients who were sent to Kalaupapa. After an environmental study was done, there are two sites for the location of the Memorial. Both sites are located within the boundaries of the old Baldwin Home. This is the site that the patients, both living and deceased, preferred. Sister Mary Laurence Hanley shares this story about the Old Baldwin Home: OLD BALDWIN HOME AT KALAWAO BEGINNINGS. . . The original orphanage begun by St. Damien at Kalawao was comprised of a few individual cottages which before his death were replaced by two dormitories near St. Philomena’s Church. This was Damien’s Boys’ Home. After his death in 1889, Mother Marianne Cope, in charge of Bishop Home for leprous females at Kalaupapa, a location a few miles distant from Kalawao, was asked by the Board of Health to take charge of Damien’s Boys’ home. |
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| When she agreed, the Board of Health had a convent built on the other side of the road from Damien’s establishment for the Sisters of St. Francis who would work at Boys’ Home. On May 15, 1890, three sisters moved into the convent at Kalawao. In 1891, Mother Marianne suggested a building for the smaller boys with leprosy be built near the sisters’ convent to ensure their good care and protection at night. Mother Marianne worked with the settlement Agent of the Board of Heath, R. W. Meyer, who lived on topside on proposing improvements for the two Homes she managed. |
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In 1892, when Henry P. Baldwin’s donation of $5000 began to be used for building a new orphanage, the Board of Health chose to place its buildings near the sisters’ residence to make their work more convenient. By the end of June 1894, all the boys had been moved into the new Boys’ Home. At the suggestion of R. W. Meyer, the new home was named Baldwin Home in honor of its benefactor. Upon the completion of the new Home, Mother Marianne suggested to the Board of Health that brothers be invited to teach the boys useful skills. The suggestion was taken and she helped negotiate preliminaries for their coming. Upon the arrival of the Brothers of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary on November 30, 1895, she withdrew the sisters working at Kalawao to work at the girls’ home at Kalaupapa. |
The Brothers moved into the convent at Kalawao previously used by the sisters. Both Homes had more than a dozen dormitories full of residents at the time. The Board of Health appointed Joseph Dutton, one of Mother Marianne’s chief assistants at Kalawao, who had first been an assistant to Father Damien, in charge of the Baldwin Home. What a perfect site to have a Memorial to recognize the patients in Kalaupapa. |
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Sister Alicia Damien Lau, OSF Resources: BHLB—Board of Health Letterbooks, Honolulu State Archives |
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