West Park, New York

St. Cabrini Home circa 1900

Young girls at Cabrini

Mother Cabrini's original mausoleum

St. Frances Xavier Cabrini

When Mother Cabrini first set eyes on the rolling hills of the Mid-Hudson Valley, she fell in love. Here was the place where she planned to, and eventually did, establish an orphanage for young girls. At first sight of the property that was to become Mother Cabrini's beloved orphanage, she was dismayed to learn that the property was not for sale. However, grace followed her everywhere she went. Within a short time, after the Jesuit owners grew tired of carrying water from the river, she was offered the property for a fraction of its worth, establishing her first orphanage in the United States at West Park in Ulster County, New York in 1890. But with no water, how would the orphanage care for dozens of children the Sisters had to attend to? Miraculously, Mother Cabrini envisioned digging for a spring that would provide enough water for the fledgling orphanage. The spring, found just up the hill to the west of the main road, still provides water for Saint Cabrini Home today.

Though Mother Cabrini traveled to the ends of the globe during her life, she told her Sisters that she desired to be buried at her beloved West Park. Her wishes came true when she passed on in Chicago on December 22, 1917. Upon her canonization in 1946, her body was moved to the Cabrini Shrine at Mother Cabrini High School in New York City.

When Mother Cabrini first arrived in the United States, she was promptly informed that nuns were to cover their heads with veils, a custom unfamiliar to her. She immediately sent her Sisters to purchase the cheapest, lightest fabric they could find. Each Sister was given 1 1/2 to 2 yards of fabric. The rest of the habit worn by Mother Cabrini and her Sisters varied little from the traditional attire worn by peasant women in Europe at that time. In fact, due to anti-religious fervor in her native Lombard region of Italy, when she traveled there, she and her Sisters wore not black, the traditional color of the religious, but gray and other subdued colors in order to better blend into the community. The only other variation between peasant clothing and Mother Cabrini's habit was the sash, which has four tucks. The tucks symbolize the vows of poverty, celibacy, obedience, and one other--charity. She was the only Sister in her order to wear the fourth tuck, though she encouraged all of her Sisters to make a personal commitment to charity.

In addition to the thousands of children whose lives have been permanently touched by the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart, Mother Cabrini and her order of Sisters had a tremendous impact on the local community of the Mid-Hudson Valley. Many old timers still relate stories of the Sisters who worked at the orphanage and how they would sometimes rest under the railroad trellis or spend their afternoons knocking on doors, asking for food, clothing, money, or anything else to help with the care of the orphans. Some ex-residents who've since made the Mid-Hudson Valley their home tell stories of the time here, reminiscing about uniforms they had to wear or prayers they had to recite. "I hated it at the time", one recalls, "but every moment I spent there I now cherish."

St. Cabrini Home, Inc., now operates several programs out of its West Park campus. The original orphanage was converted to a residential treatment center for adolescent boys and girls, with the first boys arriving on the grounds in 1968. Today, the agency supports the residential program for girls and a group home program with residential locations in Dutchess and Orange Counties of New York for both boys and girls. St. Cabrini Home, the first of many orphanages founded by Mother Cabrini, is the only child care agency founded by her that still survives to serve children and continues to be sponsored by the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.