Cassian Hartle

REV. CASSIAN HARTLE has recently returned to Hays as director of the Hays Catholic College, which he founded ten years ago and which has been one of the chief Catholic institutions of education in Western Kansas. It is conducted by members of the Capuchin Order and has become the center of a large religions community.

Cassian Hartle was born at Schongau, Bavaria, August 21, 1868. His father, Dr. Benedict Hartle, was born at Schongau in 1829. He graduated from a medical college at Innsbruck, Tyrol, Austria, and for many years practiced his profession as a surgeon in Bavaria. He died at Landshut, Bavaria, in 1896. Doctor Hartle married Catherine Wind, who was born in 1828 and died at Vilsheim. Of their six children Cassian was the youngest. Remigius, the oldest, died when four years old and Mary died at the age of nineteen. Frances and Anna both live at Munich, Bavaria. Matthias is a teacher in the Christian Brothers School at Greisinghofen, Austria.

Cassian Hartle attended the common schools at Schongau, and for four years studied in a state school at Landshut, Bavaria. He then came to the United States, and continued his classical course in the colleges at St. Vincent, Beatty, and at Herman, Pennsylvania, from which he graduated in 1887. In preparation for the priesthood he did his philosophical and theological work in St. Peter and Paul's Seminary at Cumberland, Maryland, where he graduated in 1893. He was ordained to the priesthood the same year at Baltimore by Cardinal Gibbons. The following year was spent as acting pastor of St. Patrick's Church at Mount Savage, Maryland. He then returned to Herman and for twelve years was teacher of classics in the college there and six years of that time was director of the school.

Father Hartle came to Hays in 1906. For three years he was pastor of St. Joseph's Church, and during that time he took upon himself the responsibility of building and founding the Hays Catholic College. The religious community now includes the church, the monastery, the college, the parish school and the Sisters' house, all located on Sheridan Avenue. All the buildings are constructed of stone except the school proper, which is of brick construction. In 1909, having seen this work prosper under his hand, Father Hartle returned east to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and established a reform school for Catholic boys at New Derry, Pennsylvania, which four years later he transferred to Pittsburgh, where in the meantime he had erected a stately building with accommodations for 150 boys at Brookline, a suburb of that city. He remained there, until 1916, and the following two years, with his headquarters at Pittsburgh, he preached "people's missions" mostly in Pennsylvania and New York states. In July, 1918, he returned to Hays and has since been director of the college. The college has had an enrollment this fall of 67, the average being 75 to 80. It furnishes a thorough high school course and also the courses of the junior college, work being proportioned between the Latin curriculum and the commercial courses.

The faculty of the college for 1918-1919 is as follows: Very Rev. Benedict Wich, O. M. Cap., president; Rev. Cassian Hartle, O. M. Cap., director, professor of religion, Latin and German; Rev. Lewis Centner, O. M. Cap., professor of Latin, English, algebra, arithmetic and sciences; Rev. Didacus Garovi, O. M. Cap., professor of religion, Latin, history, trigonometry, geometry, algebra and instrumental music; Rev. Augustine Waldvogel, O. M. Cap., professor of Latin and Greek; Rev. Norbert Staab, O. M. Cap., professor of Latin, Greek and commercial lettering; Rev. Justin Walz, O. M. Cap., professor of English, trigonometry and geometry; Rev. William Stehle, O. M. Cap., professor of English, German and natural sciences; Rev. Walter Herman, O. M. Cap., professor of Latin, Greek and German; Professor Alexander Meier, professor of English, algebra, arithmetic, history, vocal and instrumental music; Professor Valentine Weigel, professor of English, geography, shorthand, bookkeeping and typewriting.

Hays Catholic College is located at Hays, Ellis County, Kansas, on one of the main lines of the Union Pacific Railroad. The college is a massive structure, built entirely of native stone, with a metal roof. Architecturally considered, Hays Catholic College is one of the most beautiful edifices of Hays City. From a hygienic standpoint the college is as perfect as possible. Nothing was left undone to make it entirely modern and up-to-date. The class rooms are pleasant, attractive, and well lighted, and an extensive campus of twenty acres is a few blocks from the college.

Father Hartle is a third degree Knight of Columbus and a charter member of St. Joseph Council No. 1325.

Pages 2209-2210.