Reflection #71 (Only 1005 to go): Father Joe Bowen SJ

Reflection #71 (Only 1005 to go):  Father Joe Bowen SJ

In early November, the graduating class of 1963 presented Saint Ignatius with the plaque shown above.  Father Joseph Bowen, S.J., was a member of that class.

When Fr. Bowen took the helm as president, our school was perilously close to going out of business, and in fact, some folks in the community had all but written us off.  Trust me when I say that, for a married man with 4 kids, this was a scary time…and I didn’t realize how close we were to closing.

As the plaque states, Fr. Bowen was “the youngest Jesuit to be President of St. Ignatius”.   At 30 years old, he may have been the youngest president of a Jesuit institution ever, but that I can’t confirm.  Through his years as president, he was plagued by heart problems which, at the age of 41, took his life.

The plaque mentions enlarging the board of trustees to include laymen, among which were several of Chicago’s business and political leaders.  Where the plaque says, “renewed the spirit of our great school”, I would have to include bringing Bob Hope to Chicago to perform a concert on our behalf.   From that moment on, I could feel the change in the attitude of the school’s community.  There was a vitality that had previously been declining.

I heard some say that he was head-strong and had a fierce temper.  I can certainly vouch for the latter, but who’s to say that this wasn’t a part of his success.   In the spring of ’78, I was a member of a committee that Father Bowen convened to decide if we would go “co-ed”.  The committee meeting ended with the decision to table a resolution until a more complete demographic survey could be taken. 

That was close enough for Fr. Bowen.  In the summer of ’78, he announced the decision to allow young women to take the entrance exam for the ’79-’80 school year, as well as permitting young women to transfer into the upper classes. 

                             “WELL DONE, JOE”

As an interesting side-light, I recall several alumni at the time being dead-set against our going co-ed, but, when the decision was made, they were the first in line to enroll their daughters. 

A special thanks to Mike Berkery, one of Fr. Bowen’s classmates, for providing much of the information that I have included in this article.