Mother Mary Benedict Kuminska

Mother Mary Benedict Kuminska was appointed first provincial superior of the Immaculate Conception Province in Lodi, New Jersey, serving from 1913 to 1919. She immediately assumed responsibility for 345 Felician Sisters transferred from the burgeoning province in Buffalo that had reached 600 members. 
 
The new province led by Mother Benedict was allocated teaching sisters staffing 42 parish schools in regions as wide-ranging as Massachusetts, Maryland, Delaware, eastern Pennsylvania, southern New York, and New Jersey.
 
The sisters routinely taught 100 students per one small, cramped classroom, often located in a damp basement or humid attic that lacked proper lighting and ventilation. Mother Benedict worked with parishes to alleviate these overcrowded classroom conditions on behalf of the sisters and students alike.
 
Mother Benedict faced the immense challenges of building a new provincial house, as well as securing the funds to finance it. She persevered, overseeing construction and witnessing the July 22, 1915 dedication.
 
In that same year with room now available, 25 young women came to Lodi to enter the newly-opened aspirancy, a high school program with a boarding facility for girls who aspired to become Felician Sisters.
 
During Mother Benedict’s tenure, the deadly Spanish flu of 1918 struck, killing upwards of 10,000 people in New Jersey alone. Scores of sisters compassionately ministered to those afflicted, working day and night among the ill. Four sisters died of the virus.
 
An early Felician pioneer in North America, Mother Benedict seeded the New Jersey province to flourish for the next 100 years.