Saint John Neumann

John Nepomucene Neumann CSsR (German: Johann Nepomuk Neumann, Czech: Jan Nepomucký Neumann, Latin: Ioannes Nepomucenus Neumann; March 28, 1811 – January 5, 1860) was a Bohemian-born American prelate of the Catholic Church. An immigrant from Bohemia, he came to the United States in 1836, where he was ordained, joined the Redemptorist order, and became the fourth Bishop of Philadelphia in 1852. In Philadelphia, Neumann founded the first Catholic diocesan school system in the US. Canonized in 1977, he is the only male US citizen to be named a saint. Neumann's father, Philip Neumann, a stocking knitter from Obernburg am Main, moved to Prachatitz in the Kingdom of Bohemia (then part of the Austrian Empire, now in the Czech Republic) in 1802 at age 28 with his wife, Antonie Strakotinská. Antonie died in November 1804, together with the child she bore. He married the daughter of a Czech harness maker, Agnes Lepší, on July 17, 1805, and Neumann was the third of their six children: Catherine, Veronica, John, Joan, Louise, and Wenceslaus (or Wenzel). Neumann was born on March 18, 1811, and was baptized in the village church on the same day. He began his education in the town school when he was 6, and was a studious and hardworking child, whose mother called him "my little bibliomaniac" for his love of books and reading. Neumann spoke German at home and at school, and was only passably acquainted in his childhood with Czech. At age 10, Neumann's parents told him they were prepared to allow him to continue his studies after grammar school, whereas most boys of that time would soon have to begin work. The catechist of Prachatitz helped prepare boys who hoped to pursue higher studies by offering them evening lessons in Latin at his home, which Neumann attended with eight or ten other boys for the last two years of his term at grammar school.