The daughter of Joseph and Elizabeth Settles, Alice Irmin was born October 10, 1903, in Sorgho, Ky. She was the oldest daughter, cared for the children in the family of seven and took over the general chores to help her mother. After attending the Daviess County Public School at Sorgho, Alice entered the novitiate at Mount Saint Joseph when she was 18. Following her postulancy, she received the Ursuline habit on March 20, 1922, and was given the name Sister Mary Oderic.
Sister Mary Oderic began her apostolate of housekeeping at the St. Romuald convent in Hardinsburg, Ky., in 1923. The Sisters loved her. She tried to keep the mission home like the convent home at Mount Saint Joseph — comfortably simple and prayerful, the Sisters well nourished and happy. During the summer, she helped Sister Patrice Padgett at St. Mary Home in Owensboro, where her family could visit and she could help them by her advice and loving concern. Later, Sister Mary Oderic was housekeeper at St. Lawrence, Bardwell, Ky., and St. Mary Home.
Sister Mary Oderic was never physically strong. While on her last mission at St. Denis, Shively, Ky., she became very ill on April 20, 1929. She died the next day of blood poisoning at St. Joseph Infirmary in Louisville. Sister Teresita Thompson, Sister Laurine Sheeran, Mr. and Mrs. Settles, and other family members accompanied Sister’s remains to Mount Saint Joseph. Father James L. Whelan, chaplain, celebrated the funeral Mass. Sister Mary Oderic’s remains are buried in the convent cemetery.
Sister Mary Oderic Settles I and Sister Mary Oderic Settles II were blood sisters. The younger one entered after her older sister had died three years earlier and was given the same name in religion.