By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press
WORCESTER – She was named for her grandfather and baptized at school – just after the ribbon cutting for the new science lab dedicated to him.
How her family got here is a story in itself.
Holy Name Central Catholic Junior/Senior High School held the ribbon cutting for the Joseph Tham Pham Life Sciences Biotech Learning Center Sept. 14. It was Founders Day, when the school honors the Sisters of St. Anne.
Also being honored this year was the late Mr. Pham, whose family came in from as far away as San Francisco and Utah for the celebration. His children – Holy Name alumni Naja Mary-Nga Pham Lockwood, Huy D. Pham and Han N. Pham – donated money for the laboratory, which is in the school building. The major donors were Naja Lockwood and her husband, David.
After the ribbon cutting, the family and friends squeezed into the school’s tiny chapel for the baptism of Josephine Hannah Linh Yao, daughter of Han Pham and her husband, Spencer Yao.
Administering the sacrament was Father Dennis J. O’Brien, diocesan minister to priests, who was headmaster in the 1980s when the Pham family attended Holy Name.
He reminded them how, when they came here from Vietnam years ago, religious sisters and Msgr. Edmond T. Tinsley – their “American grandfather” – helped them feel Christ’s presence. That’s what they want for Josephine, who will honor her grandfather with her name and “look to all of us” for help in living out her baptism, he said.
Father O’Brien told The Catholic Free Press later that he gave Josephine’s mother a copy of a letter she wrote when seeking a scholarship at Holy Name. It was about the family’s escape from Vietnam and it moved him to tears, he said. He’s kept it all these years, and used it in parish missions.
Now the mother wants to hand on that history to her daughter, Father O’Brien said. Oh yes, and she got the largest scholarship.
“All of them were very involved in the school,” he said of the siblings. “They really invested and became part of the family.”
After the baptism the principal, Edward Reynolds, told them: “It’s been one of the best days” at Holy Name. “We’ll continue, with the spirit of your family and the spirit of Holy Name.”
Josephine’s mother told The Catholic Free Press that Msgr. Tinsley, Sister Mary Barry and other Sisters of Mercy sponsored their family to come to the United States after the fall of Saigon. The priest and sisters became their family, celebrating birthdays, weddings and funerals with them.
“Msgr. Tinsley was the first person I called (at 2 a.m.) when my dad passed away” in 2002, she said.
They lived at McAuley Nazareth Home for Boys in Leicester, where the priest and some of the sisters served. The sisters got them enrolled in Our Lady of the Angels Elementary School, and from there they went on to Holy Name.
In an email to The Catholic Free Press, Han Pham said her father was a high school principal in Vietnam “who taught us the importance of education and giving back, especially to the Catholic community in Worcester who truly helped us rebuild our lives in the U.S.”
“Holy Name provided all three of us with the tools to explore our passions and with acceptances to good colleges and graduate schools which helped us further our own respective careers,” Mrs. Lockwood wrote, when asked why they supported the lab. “We thought this was a meaningful way to honor the memory of our beloved father and give back to future generations of students…”
Scott Anderson, director of development, said that when Holy Name was seeking donations for the lab, he and Mr. Reynolds contacted the Lockwoods “because a number of years ago…they had said… ‘At some point we really want to do something big for the school.’”
In May 2017 the school announced a $50,000 leadership gift from the Lockwoods.
Mr. Anderson said Worcester Polytechnic Institute helped design the room and determine the equipment to purchase, and it now says the lab will provide students with the opportunity to be prepared for college.