When St. Frances Academy in East Baltimore defeats a better-funded high school sports competitor, I see the legacy of a woman wearing a white bonnet. I see the long shadow that Elizabeth Lange has cast in Baltimore.
Well-educated and French-speaking, Lange arrived here from Saint-Domingue, now Haiti, about 1800 and was probably appalled at the dearth of education options for black children. A woman of color herself, she opened a free school in Fells Point and later founded a Roman Catholic women's religious order, the Oblate Sisters of Providence, the first Roman Catholic African-American religious community. The Oblate Sisters founded and continue to operate St. Frances Academy.
Many are asking that Mother Mary Lange, as she is commonly referred to, be canonized as a saint, a process that can take decades.
In the meantime, the congregation at St. Mary of the Assumption in Govans has decided that, official saint or not, Mother Lange deserves the kind of recognition that a likeness in a stained-glass window brings. The parish passed the hat and raised $2,500. Then they found Artisan Glass Works on Union Avenue in Hampden, which did the work.
Her portrait, rendered in glass and paint, was installed last week. It contains the inscription, "Our sole wish is to do the will of God."
It's a nicely done tribute to one of Baltimore's little-known but most inspirational women.
I spoke with Milton Dugger, a member of the St. Mary's parish on York Road. A native Baltimorean, he grew up on the west side. He attended public schools, but as a Roman Catholic he got to know the order of nuns that Mother Lange founded. The sisters had their own school for the religious training of their novice sisters at Mosher Street near his home. They prepared him for his Confirmation many years ago.
"There is a time for everything, and now is the time for Mother Lange," he said. "Those sisters were role models for our neighborhood."
Dugger, who was baptized at St. Peter Claver Church on Fremont Avenue, later became a member of a neighboring parish, Immaculate Conception. A devoted student of Baltimore history, he remains appalled at the demolition during the urban renewal-crazed 1960s of the Neo-Baroque Immaculate Conception Church.
He was married at that church. His wife, Barbara, was educated at St. Frances Academy, where Elizabeth Lange died in 1882.
"It was time to do something good, something that preserves history," he said of the window project.
Like so many old-fashioned Baltimoreans, he dislikes change and the disappearance of important parts of the city's history.
"Mother Lange should be with us," he said. "Other built landmarks, like Pennsylvania Avenue, where I walked every day until I was about 21, are gone. We need to revere our past."
The window took a while to be completed. When it arrived, it was placed in a recently created Mother Lange Chapel within the church. The space, which seats about 32 worshippers, was once a drum-and-bugle corps room and later a Boy Scout meeting space.
The Lange chapel was completed and blessed by St. Mary's pastor, the Rev. Martin Nocchi, a few weeks ago, before the window was ready.
The chapel made use of repurposed fittings from another worship space, one used by the School Sisters of Notre Dame when they staffed the old St. Mary's Parochial School. That school, built next to the church, is now Tunbridge Charter School.
Martin Worzask, the parish's facilities manager, did most of the construction work and kept to a budget. The chapel and window are worthy tributes to a charismatic religious leader.