(1931-2023)

Jeanette Jabour’s family history was always a source of great pride to her. Her parents, Kalil and Anesa (Michael) Jabour, were born in Beirut, which today is in Lebanon but at the time was part of Syria. The couple met and married there.
 
Around the time their first child, a boy, was born (he died about a year and a half later), Kalil and several of his brothers decided to flee their homeland because there was a war going on between Syrian and Lebanese factions and the Syrians were conscripting Lebanese men to fight on their side. It was deemed safe to leave women and children behind because the Muslim Syrians would not harm them due to their religious beliefs, so the men escaped in a small boat across the Mediterranean to France.
 
A long and winding journey then took them through Africa, South and Central America, and Connecticut, and finally, they settled in Mishawaka, Indiana. A year after their escape, the situation back home had stabilized enough that Kalil and the other married men were able to return to Beirut to bring their families to America. A second Jabour son was born in Mishawaka, and then the family moved to Detroit, where seven more children were born, including Jeanette, the youngest. The son born in Indiana died at about 18 months of age, leaving Joe, Nick, Hank, Sam, Nell, Sabina, and Jeanette to grow up together.
 
Jeanette was the only one of all the Jabour children to be born in a hospital. Kalil had found a job at the Ford Motor Company when the family first came to Detroit, but with the Great Depression raging, he had been laid off, and Henry Ford himself agreed to cover the cost of Jeanette’s birth as long as she was born in Henry Ford Hospital.

Memorial gifts may be made to Adrian Dominican Sisters, 1257 East Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, Michigan, 49221. 

Read more about Sister Jeanette. (PDF)

Sister's Memorial Card (PDF)

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