Sr. Marylu StueberA funeral Mass for Sister Marylu Stueber, a Franciscan Sister of Mary for 61 years, was held April 9 in the chapel at The Sarah Community in Bridgeton. Sister Marylu died March 28 at DePaul Hospital in Bridgeton. She was 83.
When asked in 1978 to establish and direct the archives for the Sisters of St. Mary (SSM) and, after reunification, for the Franciscan Sisters of Mary (FSM), Sister Marylu approached it with the thoroughness and attention to detail for which she became known. For 35 years she headed the archives, retiring at the end of May 2013. During that time, she was a founding member of the St. Louis Area Religious Archivists (SLARA), begun in 1986; she served as chair of SLARA from 1987-96. Besides receiving an award from SLARA in 1996 for her dedication and organizational skills, in March 2008 she received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of St. Louis Area Archivists for her contributions to the fields of history and archives in the St. Louis area.
Born Mary Lu Anne Stueber on Aug. 30, 1940, in St. Louis, she was the oldest of five children of William J. and Bernice C. (Koerner) Stueber. She earned her bachelor’s in nursing from Saint Louis University in 1963. She entered the Sisters of St. Mary on Sept. 1, 1963; she received the name Sister John Maura, and she professed final vows on July 30, 1972.
She was a nurse at St. Mary’s Health Center (1966–68) and nursing supervisor at Mount St. Rose Hospital (1968–1970). She wrote the policies and procedures manual for St. Clare Hospital in Baraboo, Wisconsin (1970–71), then served as statistician for the Central Office at St. Mary’s Health Center (1971–74). From 1975 through 1977 she performed secretarial work for the congregational leadership.
In 1978, when she was asked to establish the congregation’s archives, no computer programs were available for maintaining records. She attended computer classes and learned enough programming to set up methods to track the congregation’s holdings. For the next 35 years, she managed the FSM archives, working in cooperation with the SSM archivist. In May 2010, the FSM archives were moved to the site of the SSM Health corporate archives; in this new setting, she administered the FSM archives until her retirement three years later, when the SSM archivist assumed responsibility for the FSM archives.
Sister Marylu was preceded in death by her parents, her brother and an infant sister. She is survived by two sisters, Suzanne (Kenneth) Baremore of Battlefield, Missouri, and Roberta (Peter) Kellen of Lake Forest, California; as well as nieces, nephews, relatives and friends.
Burial was in Calvary Cemetery.