La Salette in Olivet, IL.

La Salette in Olivet, IL.

Very Rev. Michael Lokbouch, M.S. (1889 - 1957)

The La Salettes of the previous Province of Mary, Queen of Peace, had their roots in the La Salette Province of Poland. During the Second World War, Fr. Michael Kolbruch, M.S., the Provincial of the Missionaries of Our Lady of La Salette in Poland, fled to the United States from Janowska Concentration Camp during World War II.

In 1941, he opened a minor seminary at Olivet, IL., in the diocese of Peoria. The former College of the Nazarene was converted into a large seminary for Polish missionary students, named La Salette Calvary Seminary. Polish-Americans associated the theme of Calvary with much of their lives in their old homeland. Considering the sufferings of Poland at that time, the new seminary was suitably named.

The Chapel and Seminary were dedicated on April 26, 1941. The first school year saw an enrollment of about 25 students of Polish heritage. Soon a Novitiate was founded for candidates to La Salette religious life on the property. The huge college plant offered considerable opportunity for the full expansion of the seminary. It included a large modern administration building with classrooms, another modern building for student quarters and twelve homes for the faculty. Also it had a new gymnasium, a power plant, a farm with barns and 120 acres of fertile land in central Illinois.

Eventually the property housed the minor seminary, novitiate, college and theologate.

After the war, the Iron Curtain enveloped Poland and there was very little

Fr. Stanley Matuszewski, M.S. (1915 - 1993)

communication allowed with anyone. The General Chapter of 1958 decided to attach the foundation in Olivet, IL., to the St. Louis Province. The Olivet District became a Vice-Province in 1967 and then a Province in 1982.

 

During this transition to a Province, the members of the Olivet district assumed the ministerial responsibilities of Polish speaking parishes in the Provinces of Manitoba and Ontario, Canada. Also a house was established in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and a Shrine was opened in 1967 in Twin Lakes, Wisconsin. Due to a decrease of vocations, the parishes were returned to the Dioceses and Olivet The entire property was sold. It was renamed the Notre Dame de La Salette Boys Academy

Fr. Stanley Matuszewski, M.S. was director of the seminary and a teacher and also founded and edited the national monthly "Our Lady's Digest" from 1925 until his death in 1993.

Please take a look at some of the pictures!