The History of the Young Ladies Institute, YLI

History of Hughson, California: The People, the Places, the Traditions of a Small Town

Antoinette Institute No.193 Young Ladies’ Institute, popularly known as YLI, celebrated 75 years in Hughson on May 19, 2024, with a Mass of Thanksgiving at St. Anthony’s Catholic Church at 11:30 a.m. A luncheon and meeting for families and guests followed.

The Hughson Institute was chartered on May 15, 1949, and remains an active and vibrant part of the parish. Its members range from age 14 to 95.

YLI was founded in San Francisco on September 5, 1887, by Mary E. Richardson, Emily Coogan and Annie Sweeney. Sweeney lived with another young woman who contracted tuberculosis and had no other support than her friends.

The women rallied together to help her.

That decision led to the idea of a society of young Catholic women who could provide material and social assistance to other women. Under the guidance of Fr. John J. Prendergast, Vicar General of the Archdiocese, they petitioned their friends to meet at Washington Hall, 35 Eddy Street in San Francisco. One hundred fifty women came.

Soon, eight institutes were erected in San Francisco, Grass Valley, Nevada City and Benicia. Twenty-five delegates attended YLI’s first convention in St. George Hall on Market Street in San Francisco in April 1888.

Small-sized institutes facilitated members’ ability to provide personal care and service to one another, caring for sick sisters and even assisting with funeral expenses. YLI ran a relief station following the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, utilizing the funds held by the Institute until banks reopened. They helped women with clothing and other material goods. During World War I, members joined the Red Cross and formed the largest unit in San Francisco. They established Catholic centers in neighborhoods of large military camps.

YLI institutes spread to Central California, where the largest concentration of membership exists today.

In Hughson, Mary Pimental, Hazel Genzoli and Doris Mays were among the charter members of Antoinette Institute #193. The local parish priest initiated it, seeking out Pimental to present the idea. He recruited more women from the parish. The group of young women met twice a month and pursued those same ends, material and social support, as the charter members of what is now known as YLI Grand Institute.

Institutes follow Robert’s Rules of Order for their meetings and are led by a president elected annually and officers. The same structure is mirrored at the national level. In the early 1980s, the Grand President initiated the first Grand President’s Program to create ways to address the needs of the local church.

Genzoli’s daughter, Dyan Hollenhorst, is an active member today. The Hughson Chronicle & Denair Dispatch spoke with Hollenhorst, who said, “It was all founded on the idea of women helping each other.” Today, as during their founding, the heart of their work was to ask, “What does father need? How do we support the community? How do we support each other?”

The Institute produced a monthly newsletter called the “Yak Yak,” which included pregnancy announcements and other news.

Hollenhorst grew up surrounded by that social network. Recalling “a childhood of Christmas, swim parties, and family picnics hosted in conjunction with Knights of Columbus.” She said, “That was where our parents socialized.”

While a branch of YLI exists for Catholic Men, called the Young Men’s Organization, at St. Anthony’s, Hollenhorst said YLI has always been linked with the Knights of Columbus. Wives joined YLI, husbands joined the Knights of Columbus, and the families supported parish life and Catholic action. With this partnership, the women’s only organization did not feel like a group that excluded men because they were “men and women working together for a common mission.”

Hollenhorst joined at 16. “I remember, as a teenager, one of the women having cancer. The other women came together and helped her. I was so young I just knew what YLI was. It was always part of my world.”

When someone died, or a baby was born, other members brought food. “That’s just what you did in their time of great need.” She said, “I knew that’s what we did, but I never understood the impact until it was my mother we were burying, and this group of women just came together and carried me through this life event.”

As a young mother, she said, “It was the idea of experiencing an evening out with women friends that attracted her back to the institution.”

Charter member Mary Pimental drew Hollenhorst into serving as an officer. “One of the beautiful things about YLI is the leadership and opportunities for leadership and growth that it gives.”

As Hollenhorst’s children grew, she returned to college and graduated from California State University Stanislaus in 2002. She earned her masters from the Franciscan School of Theology in 2008 and became Chancellor of the Stockton Diocese in 2018. Without the leadership skills she learned in YLI, Hollenhorst said she would not be where she is today.

The women’s organization, where “We can be wholeheartedly unapologetically ourselves,” started as a sisterhood of young women and has evolved into an intergenerational organization. You can have sisters, aunts, surrogate moms or grandmas; we span all the generations. The young ones keep us young and can help with some of the activities we used to do but, physically, maybe we can’t anymore. We share the wisdom that we’ve gained. We’ve learned from each other.”

YLI Grand President Esther Vasquez attended the anniversary celebration in Hughson.

Originally published in the Hughson Chronicle & Denair Dispatch on May 21, 2024. The Hughson Chronicle & Denair Dispatch is part of MidValley Publications - committed to the power of the positive press. Reprinted with Permission.

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