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(1934-2025)
Although she was baptized as Theresa Patricia, the Kubiak family always called their youngest child Janet, and a legal name change as an adult made it official.
Janet was born in Detroit on October 23, 1934, to Frank and Clara (Fitch) Kubiak, the last of nine children born to the couple. Her five brothers and three sisters were George, Stanley, John, Frank, Thomas, Marion, Cecilia, and Verna.
Frank made headlines in the Detroit Free Press and other newspapers in 1942 thanks to a miraculous restoration of his eyesight. In 1913, an accidental shotgun blast to the face left him blind in his right eye. Then, several months before Janet’s birth, while at his job at the Briggs Manufacturing plant in the Detroit enclave of Highland Park, shards of steel pierced his left eye and blinded it as well despite multiple surgeries to try and save his sight.
But then, in May 1942, his son John was guiding him home from church and the pair were crossing the street when a car approached. John pulled his father toward the curb and Frank tripped, landing on his hands and knees – and suddenly could see dimly with his left eye. Over the next few days, vision in that eye continued to improve … and he could finally see his youngest child for the first time. The only explanation doctors could give was that perhaps the fall had jarred a piece of steel loose or had released pressure on the optic nerve.
The family lived right by Holy Name Church, on Detroit’s east side, and Janet attended the parish school, which was staffed by the Adrian Dominican Sisters. “I would often walk to and from school with one of the Sisters as they walked by our house (going to or from the convent),” she wrote in her autobiography.
Read more about Sister Janet (PDF)
Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, MI, 49221. Funeral arrangements are being handled by Anderson-Marry Funeral Home, Adrian.
Sister's Memorial Card (PDF)
Note: To view recordings with closed captioning, they must be viewed on our public video library rather than through the links below.
Recording of Sister Janet's Vigil Service - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
Recording of Sister Janet's Funeral Mass - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
Leave your comments and remembrances – if you don't see the comment box below, click on the "Read More" link.
(1937-2025)
Joseph Martin and Magdalene Woerner, Sister Patricia Martin’s paternal grandparents, were both born in Germany, came to the United States a year apart, and found themselves in north-central West Virginia, where they met and married. The couple went on to have fifteen children, one of whom was Sister Patricia’s father, John.
John served in the U.S. Army during World War I and was sent to France just before the armistice was signed. When he returned home, he went to Detroit to live with his sister and brother-in-law and found work in the automotive industry.
In the summers when the plant was shut down for model changeover, he would travel back to West Virginia to visit his family, and during one of those trips, apparently through mutual friends, he met a vivacious young telephone operator named Louise Hartung, who lived in Cumberland, Maryland.
The couple were married in 1926 in Cumberland and made their home in Detroit, where Edward, Patricia, Rose, John, Barbara, Dolores, and Martha all came into the family. Patricia was born on April 4, 1929.
Patricia’s first-grade education came thanks to the Adrian Dominican Sisters at St. Brigid School in Detroit. When she was ready to start second grade, with John’s factory job no longer enough to support the family, her parents decided that since John had been raised on a farm they wanted to find someone with a farm who wanted to trade that farm for their home.
Read more about Sister Patricia (PDF)
Recording of Sister Patricia's Vigil Service - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
Recording of Sister Patricia's Funeral Mass - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
When the three Adrian Dominican Sisters who founded the Colegio Santo Domingo – Sisters Mary Philip Ryan, Thomas Ann (Eileen) Burke, and Rudolf (Dorothea) Beuttenmuller – arrived in the Dominican Republic in September 1945 to begin the process, one of the first people they met there was Humberto Ruíz Castillo, the architect/builder selected for the project.
Among the four boys and three girls born to Humberto and his wife, Ana (Berges) Castillo, were two girls who would soon become Colegio students and would go on to join the Congregation: Teresita, known as TeTe, and Margarita, called Margot, the youngest of the seven. Their siblings were Fernando, Humberto, Hugo, Felix, and Pura.
Margot was born in Santo Domingo on March 6, 1937. Her earliest schooling came at the Franciscan Colegio Serafin Asis, which she attended through fourth grade. When the Colegio Santo Domingo opened in 1946, she transferred and was a student there until her junior year of high school.
Right from the start of the Adrian Dominican presence in Santo Domingo, the Sisters and the Ruízes had a very close relationship. “I became very fond of the Sisters, who were joyous, prayerful, intelligent, and friendly,” Sister Margot wrote in her autobiography. “When I decided to enter religious life, there was but one choice: the Adrian Dominicans. When I told Sister Mary Philip of my interest in religious life, she immediately helped me to make arrangements to go to Adrian. I think she was afraid some other congregation would get me.”
Read more about Sister Margarita (PDF)
Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, MI, 49221.
Recording of Sister Margarita's Vigil Service - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
Recording of Sister Margarita's Funeral Mass - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
(1927-2025)
The Good Lord always comes to my rescue. He has showered me with many gifts and blessings and has always put wonderful people in my life. Now I have friends who have come into my life and accepted me into their family and for this I am eternally grateful and love them all.
Sister Anne Lindquist completed her autobiography, in which this paragraph appears, when she was nearing her eighty-fifth birthday and was in many ways taking stock of her life. As an only child and therefore without any siblings, nieces or nephews, friends had become her family and had given her life great richness.
Anne was born on August 16, 1927, in Chicago. Shortly after her birth, she was adopted by William and Anne (Danne) Lindquist – an adoption she did not know about until she was in her late fifties and which, not surprisingly, came as a great shock. Her birth name was Ruth Ann, but her adoptive parents had her baptized as Annie Laurie.
William worked for W. C. Danne Insurance Co., the firm owned by his brother-in- law. Anne attended first grade at St. Ambrose School; then the family bought a home near St. Philip Neri School and she completed her elementary education there.
Anne was in sixth grade when her parents divorced. The whole succeding year was a difficult and unhappy one, and because divorce carried such a stigma at the time, she did not want anyone to know what was happening. “Dad left on a Holy Thursday,” she wrote in her autobiography. “I was all dressed up to be in the Holy Thursday procession and wanted so for him to see me in the procession.”
She rarely saw her father until after she entered the Congregation. Then, “Dad never missed a visiting day and came laden with boxes of Fannie May (chocolates),” she wrote. “One summer he came to visit me in Adrian with the trunk of his car filled with Good Humor bars packed in dry ice.”
Read more about Sister Anne (PDF)
Recording of Sister Anne's Memorial Mass - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as." Worship Aid (PDF)
Recording of Sister Anne's Ritual of Remembering - After clicking the link, download the recording by right-clicking on the video choosing "Save video as."
Our Adrian Dominican cemetery with its circular headstones is a beautiful place of rest for women who gave their lives in service to God — and a peaceful place for contemplation and remembrance.
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