Sister Anne Fahey was honored last Friday at Elizabeth Seton Academy’s 8th Annual Autumn Action held at Florian Hall. A native of Dorchester who helped to start the all-girls Catholic high school in 2003, Sr. Fahey recently marked her 60th anniversary as a Sister of Charity of Halifax— which she called “the great joy of my life.”

“As I reach retirement age another great joy of my life is to be associated with ESA,” Sr. Fahey told the Reporter. “I was so blessed to be one of the founders of this school and I have been able to watch it grow. I’ve seen the magnificent job that the faculty, the board, and this principal [Dr. Maureen T. White] have done with these kids, who are the best.”

The school is located in Lower Mills on the campus of the former St. Gregory High School. ESA is named in honor of Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton, a native New Yorker who was a wife and mother of five who went on to start a religious order of women, The Sisters of Charity.

Elizabeth Seton became the first native-born American saint in the Catholic Church after she was canonized on Sept. 14, 1975. She started a Catholic School in Baltimore that paved the way for the expansion of the Catholic parochial school system in this country.

Sr. Fahey was on hand at the school last Wednesday for special classes focused on The Great American Smokeout initiative by the American Cancer Society. Dr. Alice Coombs gave an informative PowerPoint presentation showing both a healthy lung and a damaged lung that made quite an impact on the girls of ESA.

Dr. Coombs, who works as a specialist at South Shore Hospital and Milton Hospital, is President of the Massachusetts Medial Society and a frequent visitor to the Lower Mills campus.