Alfred Boeddeker
{{Short description|American Franciscan friar}}
{{more footnotes|date=September 2011}}
{{Unreferenced section|date=August 2024}}
{{Infobox Christian leader
| type = Priest
| honorific_prefix = Father
| name = Alfred Boeddeker
| title = Founder of St. Anthony Dining Room, St. Anthony Free Medical Clinic
| image = File:Alfred Boeddeker OFM 1971.png
| caption = Father Alfred Boeddeker (1971)
| church = Roman Catholic Church
| diocese = San Francisco
| ordained_by =
| ordination = 1927
| birth_name = Anthony Boeddeker
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1903|08|07}}
| birth_place = San Francisco, California, U.S.
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1994|01|01|1903|08|07}}
| death_place = San Francisco, California, U.S.
| nationality = American
| religion = Roman Catholic
| occupation = Franciscan Priest, Humanitarian
| motto = *"The great activity of our life is to love." *"I see God as one act—just loving, like the sun always shining."
| patronage =
}}
Alfred Boeddeker, O.F.M. (August 7, 1903 as Anthony Boeddeker — January 1, 1994) was an American Franciscan friar who is best known for having founded humanitarian programs to aid the poor and marginalised in the San Francisco Bay Area. These programs, named by Father Boeddeker for Saint Anthony of Padua, include the St. Anthony Dining Room (1950), the St. Anthony Free Medical Clinic (1956), and the St. Anthony Farm, {{convert|315|acre|km2}} near Petaluma in Sonoma County, California. The dining room and medical clinic are part of the St. Anthony Foundation.
Biography
Anthony Boeddeker was born in San Francisco, California. He joined the Franciscans in 1921 as brother Alfred and was ordained a priest in 1927. He studied theology at the Santa Barbara Seminary and pastored at the St. Rafael Church in Goleta, California. From 1930 to 1933 studied in Rome, Italy. After his return from Rome, he taught for fifteen years at the Franciscan School of Theology at the Mission Santa Barbara.{{cn|date=August 2024}}
Boeddeker was selected to start a Catholic university in Hankou, China. In preparation for this assignment, he enrolled in a graduate program at the University of California, Berkeley to study Mandarin, Japanese and Russian languages and Chinese history and politics. The Hankou plans were cancelled, however, after the Chinese Civil War ended in a victory for the Chinese Communist Party on the mainland in 1949. Father Boeddeker was then appointed pastor of St. Boniface Church in the Tenderloin, San Francisco, California, where he remained for the rest of his life.{{cn|date=August 2024}} Not far from this church, two of Boeddeker's sayings are prominently displayed on the walls of the St. Anthony Dining Room on Jones Street
Legacy
File:Singers of the Street at Compton's Cafeteria Riot 50th anniversary - 1.jpg
A park and recreation center named after Boeddeker is located in the Tenderloin neighborhood of San Francisco. The recreation center features the sculpture Redding School, Self-Portrait, (4 ft. x 16 1/2 ft. x 2 1/4 in.) which was created as a tribute to Boeddeker by artist Ruth Asawa with assistance from children at Redding Elementary School. The piece, a bas relief wall mural, consists of a portrait of Boeddeker surrounded by children and scenes from San Francisco, including animals, street cars, cars, houses, airplanes and birds. The mural is made of glass fiber reinforced concrete and is framed with a plain concrete border. Children from the school created images with pastry dough which were then added into the mural. The piece was surveyed in 1993 by the Smithsonian Institution's Save Outdoor Sculpture! program and was described as needing conservation treatment.{{cite web | title=Redding School, Self-Portrait, (sculpture). | work=Save Outdoor Sculpture, California, San Francisco survey | publisher=Smithsonian Institution | url=http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!341888~!0#focus | accessdate=24 September 2011}}
Further reading
Hartmann, Madeline. The Man behind the Miracle: the Story of Alfred Boeddeker, O.F.M. Fort Bragg: Lost Coat Press (2000). {{ISBN|1-882897-40-4}}
References
{{reflist}}
- [https://archive.today/20130223210142/http://www.americancatholic.org/Messenger/Oct2005/Feature2.asp "St. Anthony Dining Room: The Loaf Keeps on Multiplying"] in American Catholic, October 2005.
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20070205191020/http://catholic-sf.org/081503.html "Saint Anthony’s celebrates founder’s centenary"] in Catholic San Francisco, August 15, 2003.
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20070213221119/http://www.fst.edu/aboutFST/history.html History of the Franciscan School of Theology.]
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20070316191225/http://www.saintbonifacesf.org/history.htm History of St. Boniface Church] in the Tenderloin.
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20060902173136/http://www.familymedicine.medschool.ucsf.edu/education/student_progs/supplementary_clinics.aspx#STANTHONYSCLINIC St. Anthony's Clinic] as described by the University of California, San Francisco Medical school.
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20110729094320/http://www.saintanthonyfarm.info/ St. Anthony Farm website] (no longer operated by the Foundation)
External links
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20060908013503/http://www.sfneighborhoodparks.org/parkhistories/boeddekerpark.html History of Boeddeker Park], Neighborhood Parks Council.
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20060802010004/http://my.sfgov.org/photogallery/photogallery.aspx?dept=116&search=indexpage&criteria=Father%20Alfred%20Boeddeker%20Park&cS=2&img=P703&id=414&page=0&major=&sub=&PoL=&imgNum=2&total=2 Photograph of Father Alfred Boeddeker] at the dedication and groundbreaking ceremony for Boeddeker Park, named in his honour.
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20070311042200/http://www.pps.org/great_public_spaces/one?public_place_id=88 Boeddeker Park], analysis and commentary, Project for Public Spaces.
- [http://sflib1.sfpl.org:82/search/dBiography+U/dbiography+u/47,0,0,E/2exact&FF=dboeddeker+father+alfred&1,27, Historical photographs of Father Boeddeker] in the collection of the San Francisco Public Library.
- [http://www.stanthonysf.org/ St. Anthony Foundation website]
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Boeddeker, Alfred}}
Category:American Friars Minor
Category:History of San Francisco
Category:Officers Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany