Rose Hawthorne, the daughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne, was born in Boston but spent most of her childhood in England. It was a happy, cultured life with travel and exposure to the arts. This was where she was introduced to Catholic culture. In 1891 Rose and her husband George entered the Catholic Church. In 1887 Rose conceived the idea of ministering to cancer victims after she cared for her dying friend, Emma Lazarus and later took a nursing course to help them. In 1900, after her husband's death in 1898, she and 2 other companions were invested as Dominican tertiaries. They cared for “the neediest class we know-both in poverty and suffering…”
