Sister Mary Theresa Fowler, S.C., (Sister Mary Charles), died Feb. 20, at Schervier Nursing Care Center, Riverdale. She was 85 years old.
Born in Manhattan, she attended Ascension School and Cathedral H.S. before entering the Sisters of Charity of New York in 1949. She studied at College of Mount St. Vincent and Hunter College. She later earned NYS permanent certification as teacher and administrator in the elementary schools.
From 1967 until 1971, she was principal at St. John the Baptist School, Bedford-Stuyvesant. The following year, she became coordinator of elementary education for the Sisters of Charity, then worked for one year as a guidance counselor at Bishop McDonnell H.S., Brooklyn.
After retiring from education she moved to Flushing, where she lived until moving to the Convent of Mary the Queen. In 2015, she was among a group of sisters who moved to Schervier Nursing Care Center.
I knew Theresa while she was at St. John the Baptist in Brooklyn, a time of change for Catholic Education and for Religious Life. I admired her resolve, her dedication to the school and to the SIsters in her charge. She was ahead of the time but yet a part of the reality of time as it was in the early 1970’s. And even though we had lost contact over the years, my mind also wandered back to the days at St. John’s and then her small simple apartment on Ocean Ave. in Brooklyn.