A Tender to the Poor Dies

Sister Marie Therese Solomon, whose empathy for the poor helped bring free medical treatment to tens of thousands of indigent Orange County patients over the past 20 years, died Sunday at age 90 from respiratory problems, friends and supporters said.

Beginning at an age when most people have retired, Sister Marie Therese founded the Lestonnac Free Medical Clinic in Orange in 1979, when she was 70.

Then, using a mix of personal drive and low-key persuasion, she led its expansion from a two-room office into a 35,000-square-foot, full-service medical center where more than 50 volunteer doctors, dentists and nurses treat about 700 needy patients a month, supporters said.

“That lady was the most tenacious and persuasive lady I’ve met in my life,” said Allen Boerner, a Fullerton-based real estate developer and former board member. “You wonder how people get that much energy, how they muster up that kind of enthusiasm every day. If it wasn’t for her, that clinic would not be as far along as it is. She was the driving force.”

And she was tireless, friends said.

“She never slowed down,” said Sister Mary Salud Estrada, provincial superior at the Sisters of the Company of Mary Provincial House in Tustin, where Sister Marie Therese died. “She was very energetic, very enthusiastic, about her vocation and her mission in life, which was to help the poor.”

In an interview 14 years ago, Sister Marie Therese talked about the genesis of the clinic, after she and several friends delivered food baskets to poor people around El Modena.

“We saw poor people suffering so much,” she said at the time. “We saw hungry, suffering children without any money to go to a doctor. Pregnant mothers did not know where they were going to have their babies delivered because they couldn’t afford hospitals. There were so many people in dire need of help. We thought we’d help these poor people by opening a little clinic.”

Sister Marie Therese served as executive director of the clinic, with a $300,000 annual operating budget and nine part-time employees, until she fell ill on Valentine’s Day. Her assistant, Rosalie Corless, has been running the clinic since then. Supporters said it was unclear who would take the reins.

Sister Marie Therese also was active in the Coalition of Orange County Community Clinics.

“She was very warm and compassionate, and she really cared about the people,” said Martha Earlebaugh-Gordon, the coalition’s executive director. “She really had a good business sense and was great about helping us get things accomplished. She was quite a remarkable woman.”

Before Sister Marie Therese’s death, supporters were planning a special commemorative fund-raiser, playing off a symmetry of years.

“It was for her 20-60-90,” said Stanley Pawlowski, executive vice president of Pacific Century Bank in Anaheim. “Twenty years since the clinic opened, 60 years as a nun and 90 years of age. We were planning the celebration for Aug. 21. I don’t know what the plans are now. We were going to set up an endowment fund for Sister so this clinic could go on in perpetuity.”

In a sense, the clinic has already had a charmed existence. It began as a whim.

“She felt called to do something for the poor,” Sister Mary Salud said. “She saw where the greatest need was, providing medical service to people who did not have many resources. It started small, but since then it blossomed.”

Dr. Carmelita Co-Casquejo, an Orange pediatrician who helped organize the clinic and who continues to volunteer, said the center fills a critical role.

“The clientele fall between the cracks in medical care,” she said. “They are those who cannot be on Medicaid and those who cannot afford the regular insurance or maybe are employed but there’s no insurance from the employer.”

A native of Trinidad, Sister Marie Therese entered the religious community in 1937 in England. Two years later, she became a nun and spent the war years outside London before moving to Africa in 1948 to teach in a series of Company of Mary schools. In 1952, she went to teach in Brazil, then came to the U.S. in 1961, working in the Fresno area before taking a post teaching French and music at Saint Jeanne de Lestonnac School in Tustin.

The school--and the clinic--are named after the 16th century French nun who founded the Sisters of the Company of Mary.

Friends and supporters described Sister Marie Therese as a gentle but persuasive force.

“She had a great ability to influence people,” said Charles C. Kovac of Orange, a retired Rockwell executive and former clinic board member. “She would cause people to do things they themselves didn’t realize they could do.”

One anecdote illustrates those powers. In the 14-year-old news article published in The Times, a former board member told of a man who had a flat tire outside the clinic and stopped in to use the telephone. After he made the call, he noticed he was in a waiting room and asked about the clinic. The motorist was a doctor, and by the time he left, Sister Marie Therese had signed him up as a volunteer.

“‘She looked very meek and mild but was very powerful in her commitment,” Pawlowski said. “It’s a great loss to the community, to the poor, and to the Catholic Church. And to all of us who knew her. She was, in my mind, another Mother Teresa.”

She is survived by two nieces, Dr. Marian Lewis of Riverside and Barbara Atkinson of Apple Valley; and seven grandnieces and grandnephews.

Visitation will be from 2 to 4 p.m. today and 9 to 10 a.m. Wednesday at Ferrara Colonial Mortuary, 351 N. Hewes St., Orange. The rosary will be recited at 5 p.m. today at La Purisima Church, 11712 N. Hewes St., Orange, followed by the funeral at 10 a.m. Wednesday.

Donations in lieu of flowers may be sent to Lestonnac Free Clinic, c/o Rosalie Corless, 1215 E. Chapman Ave., Orange, CA 92666.