The Church and the Land: The National Catholic Rural Life Conference and American Society, 1923–2007 church and the land: the National Catholic Rural Life Conference and American society, 1923-2007

2. O’Hara and the Formation of the Conference

32 Chapter 2 O’Hara and the Formation of the Conference O’Hara and the Catholic Rural Population Problem, 1920 Edwin Vincent O’Hara, the founder of the National Catholic Rural Life Conference (NCRLC) and eventual bishop of Kansas City, was born on a farm near Lanesboro, Minnesota, on September 6, 1881.1 His background prepared him well for his leadership of the Catholic rural life movement. O’Hara’s parents, Owen and Margaret, ran a model Catholic farm. The family was to a large extent self-sufficient; they ate food grown in their own fields and garden and meat cured in their own smokehouse and wore clothes sewn by Mrs. O’Hara. The family said their prayers together every evening, and the few books in the simple household were on religious topics . The large family of eight children had two of their number embrace religious professions: Edwin, the youngest, and one of the girls, who became a nun. The Lanesboro area had no Catholic parochial schools, so Edwin attended the local public elementary and high schools. In fact, for a period he even studied in Lutheran religious vacation (summer) schools. Later, O’Hara recognized that his personal educational experience was just one manifestation of the overall weakness of the Catholic educational system in rural areas. In 1898, Edwin left the family farm to study at St. Thomas College in St. Paul. Besides providing him with a well-rounded Catholic liberal arts education, study at St. Thomas afforded young O’Hara the opportunity 1. My sketch of the life of Archbishop O’Hara is based on J. G. Shaw, Edwin Vincent O’Hara, American Prelate (New York: Farrar, Straus & Cudahy, 1957); Timothy Michael Dolan, “Some Seed Fell on Good Ground”: The Life of Edwin V. O’Hara (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1992); and Joseph B. Collins, “Archbishop Edwin V. O’Hara, D.D., LL.D.: A Biographical Survey,” in The Confraternity Comes of Age: A Historical Symposium (Patterson, N.J.: Confraternity Publications, 1956), 1–26. Figure 1. Edwin V. O’Hara, founder of the Rural Life Bureau and National Catholic Rural Life Conference, about the time of his consecration as bishop of Great Falls, Montana, 1930. 34 The Church and the Land to listen to Populist orators such as Ignatius Donnelly and William Jennings Bryan when they spoke in St. Paul. In 1900, O’Hara entered St. Paul Seminary in the same city, where his teacher in moral theology was the Reverend John A. Ryan, who was then at work on A Living Wage. O’Hara fell under his influence, and the two former Minnesota farm boys became fast friends and lifelong cooperators in the struggle for social justice. O’Hara was ordained in 1905 and posted as assistant to the cathedral parish in Portland, Oregon, because of a priest shortage in that western diocese. Besides his usual pastoral duties, O’Hara engaged in a wide variety of activities that showed his social concern for the community. The young priest joined the Ancient Order of Hibernians and the Knights of Columbus, was appointed to the Portland Unemployment Commission, led a study group on Dante’s philosophy, and defended the Church from charges of civil disloyalty. As archdiocesan superintendent of schools from the year of his arrival, O’Hara acquired valuable experience in the problems of urban and rural schools. In 1913, O’Hara served on the committee that recommended the Oregon Minimum Wage Law, largely wrote the law, and was the first chairman of the commission that put the law into operation. The law, guided by O’Hara at every stage, was a landmark in American social legislation—the first compulsory minimum-wage law to stand a Supreme Court test.2 Thus, O’Hara, building on his sound rural and religious upbringing, took upon himself the diverse roles of priest, educator, social activist, and Progressive reformer. In 1918, he topped off these experiences by serving his country as a Knights of Columbus chaplain in France during World War I, including work in a frontline hospital during the Argonne offensive. On his return from Europe in 1919, O’Hara started his involvement in Catholic rural affairs. It began almost by accident. While still in the East, O’Hara, having expressed an interest in the subject, was requested by the National Catholic Educational Association (NCEA) to undertake a study of rural Catholic education.3 The...