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Hilbert, Mother Coletta
Educator. The foundress of the Franciscan Sisters of St. Joseph, Hamburg, N. Y. Born in Obol, near Warsaw in 1865. Daughter of Hugh and Adela Siemieniaszko. After obtaining a teacher's certificate at the institute of the Sisters of St. Charles Borromero, she became a member of the same community of nuns. She made her perpetual vows in 1888 and the following year she was sent to the U.S. to teach at St. Stanislaus School, Pittsburgh, Pa. Under the guidance of the late Father Hyacinth Fudzinski in 1897 she founded the community of the Franciscan Sisters in Trenton. N. J. In 1898 she built the Motherhouse and Novitiate adjoining to the Corpus Christi Church, Buffalo, N. Y.. in which she has been the Superior General until 1923. From 1923 to 1932, she was the local superior in Gardenville, N. Y. and Holyoke, Mass., respectively. In 1932 she came to the new Motherhouse in Hamburg, N. Y., where she remained until her death in July, 1938.

From: "Who's Who in Polish America" by Rev. Francis Bolek, Editor-in-Chief; Harbinger House, New York, 1943

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