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Annals of St. Ann's Hermitage: 1922

The 1st of the year brings the traditional ceremony of the-exchange of best wishes for a good year.

In his chat dear Brother Provincial encourages the young Brothers, Novices, Postulants, and Juniors to follow the right path which leads to perseverance.

On the date of January 6 Brother Heribert is named Director of the Provincial House. Bro. Ptolomeus, director of St. Ann's Academy in NY, and Bro. Aloysius M., director of the Juniorate in Tyngsboro.

Bro. M. Anicetus stays as local and provincial Econome.

Two entertainments are given during the winter, one by the Juniors, the other by the Novices; the latter presented scenes taken from the life of the first Brothers.

In the Spring the Brothers in charge of manual work begin a series of transformations in the Scholasticate where soon only the tailors and the Brothers Scholastics under the direction of Bro. Paul Stratonique will remain.

To have capable teachers and to foster the studies of the young Brothers, the Provincial Council is of the opinion that certain Brothers chosen by Brother Provincial take courses during the summer given by the Jesuit Fathers at Fordham.

Brother Provincial buys a considerable amount of physics, chemistry, and biology equipment in Germany.

In the Juniorate the classroom for the first year of high school is improved by adding two windows on the north side and by mounting two large slate blackboards.

An important annex for lodging the Community and enlarging the Juniorate is begun.

In the course of the Summer Stations of the Cross are erected in the Novitiate woods. The Stations in reinforced cement are made by Bro. Paul Acyndinus and the Novices who also put them up. The bas reliefs in terra cotta are imported from France.

The Way of the Cross was blessed and indulgenced by Rev. Father Solanus Dowling, O.F.M.

Shortly afterwards, Bro. Paul Acyndinus, helped by the Novices, starts and completes a wall in reinforced cement along Delafield Street. This work is done during the good months of 1922 and 1923.

The first retreat (July 16-26) for the Postulants and Novices is preached by the Rev. F. X. Doyle, S.J. 17 Postulants take the Habit and 16 Novices make their First Vows.

The second retreat is preached by Rev. Father Ch. F. Connor, S.J., and the third (in French) by Rev. F. Bruneau, S.S.S., from August 29 to September 5.

At the end of these retreats 42 young Brothers renew their Annual Vows, 7 make Perpetual Profession and BB. Francis Regis, Joseph Cecilius and Francis Borgia make the Vow of Stability.

Towards the end of the year there is an exchange of correspondence between Brother Provincial and the Knauss Brothers, owners of a slaughter house, over the pollution of our water supply by the drainage from the slaughter house built a short time before to the northeast of our property.

Mr. Thomas Lawlor, superintendent of the Bureau of Public Works of the city, answers that our property being outside the city limits, he is not competent, but since the drainage from the slaughter house flowing into the sewers of the former Fiat Co. risks polluting the city reservoirs, he is as eager as we to see the present state of affairs improve.

Brother Provincial is obliged to have Coudert Brothers intervene, our law firm in New York.

On September 16 the Knauss Brothers write that their drainage system will be modified and that the plans to be submitted for approval will have no conduits near our property.

Another letter sent to Coudert Brothers by Mr. C.A. Holmquist, Director of the Bureau of Hygiene in Albany, announces that the Knauss Brothers will have to obtain a written permission after inquiry before disposing of the waters coming from their slaughter house.

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