J. Powers - Suitable Accommodations - An Autobiographical Story of Family Life - The Letters of J. F. Powers, 1942-1963

Back row, left to right: Emerson Hynes, Harry Sylvester, George Barnett, Jim; front row, left to right: Don Humphrey, George Garrelts, John Haskins

George Garrelts and Dick Keefe (whom Seán Ó Faoláin called “a complete cynic with, deep in the blubber, a heart of ambergris”)

Jim and Seán Ó Faoláin, 1958

Joe and Jody O’Connell

Leonard and Betty Doyle, 1949

Fred and Romy Petters

Arleen and Emerson Hynes

Dick and Mary Palmquist

James Farl Powers(1917–1999): Called J. F. Powers for all published work; informally called James, Jim, JF. Born in Jacksonville, Illinois. Author of three books of short stories, Prince of Darkness (Doubleday, 1947), The Presence of Grace (Doubleday, 1956), and Look How the Fish Live (Knopf, 1975); and two novels, Morte D’Urban (Doubleday, 1962) and Wheat That Springeth Green (Knopf, 1988).

Elizabeth Alice Wahl Powers(1924–1988): Called Betty. JFP’s wife; born in St. Cloud, Minnesota; graduated with a BA in English from the College of St. Benedict, St. Joseph, Minnesota; author of a number of published short stories and one novel, Rafferty & Co . (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1969).

Their Children

Katherine Anne Powers(1947–): Called KA. Became a barmaid, cook, archivist, literary critic, and columnist.

Mary Farl Powers(1948–1992): Became a prominent artist in Ireland, a director of the Graphic Studio in Dublin, a founder of the Graphic Studio Gallery, a member of Aosdána (the Irish academy of arts and letters), for which she served as a toscaire (delegate).

James Ansbury Powers(1953–): Called Boz. Became an artist.

Hugh Wahl Powers(1955–): Became a photographer.

Jane Elizabeth Powers(1958–): Became a garden writer, photographer, and columnist.

The Powers and Wahl Families

James Ansberry Powers(1883–1985): Called Jim. JFP’s father; born in Jacksonville, Illinois. See Introduction.

Zella Routzong Powers(1892–1973): JFP’s mother; born in Seward, Nebraska. See Introduction.

Charlotte Powers Kraft(1920–1999): JFP’s sister; born in Jacksonville, Illinois; married 1944; three children.

William Kraft(1921–1994): Called Bill. Charlotte’s husband; engineer in the nuclear weapons industry in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Richard Powers(1931–1993): Called Dick. JFP’s brother; born in Quincy, Illinois; became a professor of political science at the University of Victoria, B.C., teaching international relations; married Laura Daniel in 1955; two children.

Arthur L. Wahl(1893–1973): Called Art, Papa. Betty’s father; born in St. Cloud, Minnesota; his father, a builder for whom he and his brother worked, went bankrupt in the second decade of the twentieth century, and the brothers immigrated to Alberta, Canada; raised horses and worked as casual farmhands; both returned to the United States, and Art became a successful building contractor.

Romana Seberger Wahl(1900–1991). Called Money, Mona, Nana. Betty’s mother; born in St. Cloud, Minnesota; taught school until marriage in 1922.

Patricia Wahl Bitzan(1927–): Called Patt; Patty; Pat. Betty’s sister; seven children.

Donald J. Bitzan(1926–): Called Don. Pat’s husband; watchmaker; eventually established successful jewelry store.

John Arthur Wahl(1930–): Betty’s brother; construction company manager and owner.

Irene Sticka Wahl(1931–): John Wahl’s wife; three children.

Thomas Peter Wahl(1931–): Called Tom; religious name Caedmon. Betty’s brother; Benedictine monk and priest; ordained, 1958.

Bertha Seberger Strobel(1891–1962): Called Birdie; Bertie by JFP. Betty’s maternal aunt.

Albert Strobel(1880–1963): Called Al. Birdie’s husband; successful optometrist.

Albertine Muller Seberger(1865–1957): Called Bertha; called Grandma Seberger. Betty’s maternal grandmother; born in Stillwater, Minnesota; married Peter J. Seberger (1864–1935).

Friends in the Movement (or Otherwise Associated with St. John’s)

Bronislaw Bak(1922–1981): Called Bruno. Painter, printer, stained-glass artist; taught art at St. John’s University; designed stained-glass window of St. John’s Abbey Church.

Hedi Bak(1924–2010): Called Hetty. Bruno Bak’s wife; artist; three children.

Carlos Cotton(1913–2001): Sculptor; taught at St. John’s.

Mary Katherine Finegan Cotton(1916–1992): Carlos Cotton’s wife; sister of Elizabeth Anne Finegan Doyle; Catholic Worker; eight children.

Leonard J. Doyle(1914–1970): Taught English at St. John’s Prep; translator for St. John’s Liturgical Press; his beard, a subject of great interest to Jim.

Elizabeth Anne Finegan Doyle(1918–2011): Called Betty. Leonard Doyle’s wife; sister of Mary Katherine Finegan Cotton; Catholic Worker; nine children.

Donald Humphrey(1912–1958): Called Don, Hump, Humphaus. Artist, sculptor, and chalice maker; Catholic Worker.

Mary Alice Frawley Humphrey(1912–1992): Don Humphrey’s wife; seamstress of baptismal robes; weaver; Catholic Worker; eight children.

Emerson Hynes(1915–1971): Called Em. Professor of sociology at St. John’s; at center of Catholic rural and family-life movement in the area; became Senator Eugene McCarthy’s legislative assistant in Washington.

Arleen McCarty Hynes(1916–2006): Emerson Hynes’s wife; ten children; became Benedictine nun after ten years a widow.

Eugene McCarthy(1916–2005): Called Gene. Taught at St. John’s, 1940–1943; novice for nine months, 1942–1943; married, 1945, and lived in a Catholic agricultural commune in the area for a while; later U.S. representative (1949–1959) and U.S. senator (1959–1971).

Abigail Quigley McCarthy(1915–2001): Eugene McCarthy’s wife; writer and journalist; four children.

Joseph O’Connell(1927–1995): Artist, sculptor, and printmaker; taught at St. John’s in mid-1950s; later, artist in residence at St. John’s and St. Benedict’s.