The daughter of Charles and Antoinette Losson Pfeffer, Catherine was born Feb. 18, 1903, in Jeffersonville, Ind. She attended St. James School in Louisville, Ky. Catherine’s high school years were spent at Sacred Heart Academy in Louisville taught by the Ursuline Sisters of Louisville. She graduated from there in 1921. Three years later, Catherine entered the novitiate at Mount Saint Joseph. On March 19, 1925, she received the Ursuline habit and the name Sister James Marie.
Sister James Marie served as the primary teacher at the Ursuline schools in Waverly, Chicago, Calvary, and Browns Valley, Ky., for five years. She was substitute teacher in 1930 at Hardinsburg, Rome and Bardwell, Ky. In 1931, she was recalled to Mount Saint Joseph where she spent 17 years in various positions: supervising the dishwasher for the dining rooms, helping care for the sick, managing the community store, and assisting with housekeeping and cooking. In 1948, she returned to the classroom at St Joseph School in Owensboro where she spent six years teaching the primary grades. Other assignments took her to the parochial schools in Knottsville, Stanley, New Haven, Paducah, Sorgho, and Clementsville, Ky.
Sister retired from teaching after two years at Clementsville and in 1969 returned to Mount Saint Joseph. Once again, she was occupied with various duties at the Motherhouse and the Academy until she became a patient in the infirmary, suffering from congestive heart failure. Sister James Marie died on November 3, 1992. The funeral Mass was celebrated by Father Anthony Shonis, chaplain, the morning of November 6, 1992. Sister James Marie’s remains are buried in the convent cemetery.
NOTE: Sister James Marie Pfeffer was the second of three deaths at Mount Saint Joseph on November 3, 1992. The others were Sisters Nazaria Mattingly and Joseph Marian Logsdon.