Born June 1, 1944, in Portland, Oregon, Ann Elizabeth was the daughter of Patrick and Mary Caroline Pritchard O’Harrow. She attended Sacred Heart Academy in Waterflow, New Mexico, during the years 1958-1961, and spent her senior year at Newman High School in Mason City, Iowa, graduating from there in 1962. On September 9, Ann Elisabeth entered the novitiate at Mount Saint Joseph. She received the Ursuline habit and the name Sister Carolyn Marie on August 14, 1963.
In 1967, Sister Carolyn Marie was missioned to St. Catherine School High School in New Haven, Kentucky, for one year. Her next assignment took her to Lourdes Central High School in Nebraska City, Nebraska, for eight years. In 1976, Sister Carolyn Marie spent one year on the staff at Shantivanam, a house of prayer directed by Father Ed Hayes in Easton, Kansas. During 1977, she attended Ministry Training Services in Denver, Colorado. The following year she opened Jyotiniketan (House of Light), a house of prayer on the grounds of Mount Saint Joseph. She continued with this ministry through mid-December 1981.
Sister Carolyn Marie was making plans to start a prayer house mission in Pocatello, Idaho. On December 21, 1981, she drove in snow and ice to Hartford, Ky., to pick up a camper shell to fit the truck she would be driving to Idaho. As she was returning to the Mount in early evening, she was involved in a head-on collision near Beaver Dam, Ky. Sister Carolyn Marie was taken to Ohio County Hospital at Hartford and pronounced dead on arrival. On Christmas Eve, Father Anthony Ziegler, Father Bernard Barnes, OSM, chaplain, Father John Speaks and two other priests celebrated the funeral Mass.
Sister Carolyn Marie’s remains are buried in the convent cemetery. Sister Carolyn Marie had previously requested in writing that in the grave she wanted no barrier between her and the earth she reverenced so deeply. To honor that wish, her body was lowered into the earth on a thin panel of wood, on which had been laid a blanket and a pillow. As she had lovingly embraced all creation in life, only a sheet separated her from the earth that embraced her in death.