Sister Miriam Wilson, OSB papers

Sister Miriam (Gerard) Wilson, daughter of George and Florentine Heuel Wilson, was born in Chicago on September 24, 1926. She was baptized Miriam Elizabeth. She attended Saint Scholastica ELementary School and High School. Miriam joined the community on September 16, 1945 and was invested with the Benedictine habit and given the name Sister Gerard on July 11, 1946. She made her perpetual profession in 1950. Sister Miriam taught at several elementary schools, at both high schools, conducted religious education classes during summers and served as a camp counselor at Camp San Benito. She also served as superior at Saint Scholastica Academy, Cañon City, Colorado. At Chicago's Saint Scholastica High School Sister Miriam Wilson, OSB was a much-loved moderator of the Sodality of Our Lady, of the Young Christian Students (YCS), and of student council. She spent two years at the Kresge House of Prayer in Detroit and directed a community House of Prayer one summer. While working in Cañon City, Colorado, Sister Miriam Wilson, OSB became involved in working with people in prison as a teacher and counselor. When she returned to Chicago she spent all her free time in various kinds of volunteer work especially by teaching inmates at Cook County Jail and helping them get legal aid. She was appointed full-time pastoral minister at the County Jail in 1982 and, from then on, made countless trips to Springfield, Illinois when there was a case regarding an execution and visits to Death Row in Menard. She joined others in prayer vigils when an execution was to take place. She influenced other Sisters greatly, encouraging Sister Jerome Frede, OSB to make over 1,000 prayer books for people in prison, Sister Georgine Hodnik, OSB to fill thousands of bags with donated candy for prisoners, and both Sister Charlotte Welch, OSB and Sister Eleanore Hillenbrand, OSB to correspond with prisoners, especially those on Death Row. Sister Miriam Wilson, OSB died rather suddenly of pneumonia on December 16, 1996. She bequethed her body to science. The Mass of the Resurrection was celebrated with a large group of co-workers and friends in Saint Margaret Mary Church and, for the community, in the convent chapel a few days later. In 2002, Sister Miriam Wilson, OSB's cremains were returned to the community and she is buried in Saint Boniface Cemetery.