founded St. Vincent's Charity Hospital. It opened in 1865. Mother Augustine Brulon was the first superior who oversaw the staff made up of sisters who were trained nurses. Expansion By time of the death in 1901 of the last original member of the community, Sister Saint Joseph (the former Cornelie Muselet), the congregation numbered over 100 Sisters. Over the next century, the congregation built a series of medical facilities answering different needs, from regular medical care to the care of unwed mothers. One of their institutions, St. Thomas Hospital, was the first to accept the work of Dr. Bob Smith, the co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, and his first patient in this new program to deal with this condition. One member of the congregation, Sister Ignatia Gavin, C.S.A., (1889–1966) became a leading figure in this work. In 1922, at the request of Bishop Joseph Schrembs, the congregation expanded to work in the field of education, at which time they opened St. Augustine Academy on the grounds of their motherhouse. In 1925, the first project of the newly founded social arm of the diocese, Catholic Charities, was to re-locate all the orphans cared for by the Sisters at Saint Vincent and at Saint Louis Orphanages onto 180 acres in the town of Parma, the new facility becoming known as Parmadale, the nation's first cottage-plan home for dependent children. Current period In the 1960s, the effects of Vatican II were felt by this congregation as well as most others. St. Augustine Academy was leased to another congregation, the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth. St. Ann Hospital for unwed mothers was sold. The shift of students out of Catholic schools together with the recognition that children were not the only ones in need of religious instruction caused Sisters in the 1970s to begin to work full-time in parish school of religion programs and total parish religious education. In some places Sisters now collaborate in a team-ministry approach to a parish's various needs. The Sisters are involved in parish ministry and religious education in several parishes in the Diocese of Cleveland. Their involvement in education continues through donations to various secondary schools and to the Catholic Educational Endowment. Sisters of Charity Health System The Sisters formed in 1982 what they feel was the most significant development of their health-care facilities: the formation of the Sisters of Charity Health System, a system created to