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Sister Madonna Murphy, former assistant provost at Boston University, died on February 13. She was 85.

	Sister Madonna Murphy. Photo by BU Photo Services

Baptized Catherine Agnes, but known as Colleen, Murphy was one of four children in a family of public school teachers. She attended Albertus Magnus College in Conn., then began doctoral studies at Yale University. There she met Sister Maria Renata, who encouraged her to apply for a teaching position at Saint Mary's College, which she did after receiving her doctoral degree. Then, at the age of 24, Murphy began her long service in Catholic higher education, interrupted only when she entered the novitiate in 1944.

After her canonical year, Murphy was assigned to Dunbarton College of the Holy Cross in Washington, D.C., as a French professor and later as dean of studies. She became president of Cardinal Cushing College in Brookline, then was assigned to direct Saint Mary's College Rome program for three years. In 1974, she began working with John Silber, who was then president of Boston University, first as assistant academic vice president and later as assistant provost.

In 1984, Bernard Cardinal Law asked Murphy to organize and administer the Cambridge Center for the Study of Faith and Culture. In 1987, she became its president. When the center was transferred to the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., in 1993, Murphy was assigned to Saint Angela Hall in Maryland. She joined the community of the Academy of the Holy Cross, then went to Saint Mary's Convent in Notre Dame, Ind.

In 1995, when Murphy was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Saint Mary's, her citation quoted Silber, who described her as "a woman of exemplary intelligence, energy, grace, and good humor, someone who could bring a remarkable blend of idealism and practical wisdom to task."

"Sister Madonna has had careers enough to fill several ordinary lives," said one of her friends in a tribute. "She loved her life, her family, her community, and the Church."

A memorial mass will be held for Sister Madonna Murphy on Saturday, March 24, at 4 p.m. at St. Mary's Chapel at Boston College. Bernard Cardinal Law, archbishop of Boston, will lead the celebration. An informal reception will follow. Enter the campus at the Commonwealth Ave. entrance; the chapel is the first building on the left.

Cold War captive Hermann Field,
1910-2001

Hermann Field, who spoke at Metcalf Hall last November about his five-year imprisonment in a Polish prison after being falsely accused as a Western spy, died on February 23 in his home in Shirley, Mass.

The abduction behind the Iron Curtain of Noel and Hermann Field in 1949 -- and then the disappearance of Noel's wife Herta and their foster daughter Erica Wallach -- was one of the most publicized international mysteries of the Cold War. Hermann and his wife, Kate, wrote a book entitled Trapped in the Cold War: The Ordeal of an American Family (Stanford University Press, 1999).

Hermann and Kate, much like their book, took turns during the Friends of the Libraries meeting at Metcalf Hall on November 29, 2000, describing their experience. "They said it was all one big mistake" when he was finally released in 1954, recalled Hermann. Ironically, he had actually aided antifascist refugees from Eastern Europe during World War II. "According to Stalin, we were agents of the United States who had used the cover of saving refugees to recruit operatives among top communist officials," said Hermann. "He thought that our inside knowledge of their political history could be used to implicate those he targeted for liquidation."

Noel and Herta Field were released from a Hungary jail a month after Hermann. Wallach was released from an Arctic labor camp in Russia the following year.

Although Hermann and Kate Field are foreign-born (Zurich and London, respectively), they both have deep ties to Massachusetts. Hermann, a Harvard graduate, worked as a planner for the New England Medical Center after his release. He subsequently initiated the Department of Urban and Environmental Policy at Tufts University. Kate, who spent a year as a graduate student at Smith College, held an administrative position at Harvard University until her retirement in 1978.

The Field family papers are in BU's Department of Special Collections. An exhibition, entitled Trapped in the Cold War: The Story of Hermann and Kate Field, is on display on the first floor of Mugar Memorial Library. --BF

16 March 2001
Boston University
Office of University Relations