Whenever Sister Bernadette Kenny drove through Southwest Virginia, her car was easily recognizable by the message on the back window: Be healed.
Affectionately known as “Sister Bernie,” Kenny possessed a remarkable gift for inspiring confidence in others, said Rachel Helton, who worked for four years as the development director at the Health Wagon, a nonprofit clinic that Kenny founded in Wise.
“She had a really amazing gift to lift people up, empower them, realize what their potential was,” Helton said. “And these are people with generational poverty and health issues.”
Kenny died on Saturday, hours before what would have been her 86th birthday, according to an obituary posted on the Mullins Funeral Home and Crematory website.
Her legacy is deeply rooted in Southwest Virginia, where her mobile clinic service grew to multiple brick-and-mortar health centers and the free health fairs she helped bring to the region became the largest in the United States.
The Health Wagon, which Kenny founded in 1980, stands as a lasting testament to her legacy. As a nurse practitioner, Kenny loaded her Volkswagen Beetle with medical supplies and set out to deliver care to the isolated mountain communities in the region. This initiative laid the foundation for the Health Wagon, which became the first mobile clinic in the United States.
“Understanding social determinants of health in 1980 was incredible, and realizing that mitigating barriers to access is the key to getting people treated,” Helton said. “Health care wasn’t a building for her. It was going to people and helping them where they were with what she had.”
Born in Boston in 1938, Kenny joined the Medical Missionaries of Mary when she was 19 years old, according to an article in Irish America, a magazine that highlights Irish interests in North America.
The Medical Missionaries of Mary is an international organization of Catholic women who work to deliver health care to underserved communities around the world. Kenny spent five years in Ireland studying to become a nurse and midwife at Lady of Lourdes Hospital. After completing her training, she briefly returned to the United States before relocating to Tanzania, where she worked as a midwife for 10 years, Irish America reported.
At the request of the Richmond Catholic Diocese, she moved to Southwest Virginia in 1978 and remained for 46 years, devoting herself to improving health care access in the region.
She viewed health care from a holistic perspective, from participating in health policy reform to setting up a massage table at summer health fairs that would draw thousands.
In 1989, her commitment to her community led to her arrest during a coal miners’ strike in Southwest Virginia. According to an Associated Press article, she was among 17 people arrested after positioning her medical van near a community center on the highway to provide care to the miners. She was charged with impeding traffic and contempt of court.
Those who worked with Kenny retell this story with a laugh.
“That was through her love of the mountain people, the coal miners and her sympathy for them and their plight,” said Dr. Joseph Smiddy, a pulmonologist in Southwest Virginia who has served as the medical director at the Health Wagon for 25 years.
Inspired by Kenny’s dedication, Smiddy continues to work, despite being 82 years old.
“I’m still going in the spirit that Bernie gave me,” Smiddy said.
The impact of her work had a ripple effect, stretching far beyond Southwest Virginia. Smiddy recalled how sharing stories about Kenny became his way of connecting with communities during his own medical missions.
“Everywhere I would go I’d tell Bernie stories, and the Bernie stories would firm the situation up. The Bernie stories would get me in a Catholic school or in a Catholic orphanage. I’m a Methodist who’s slept in more convents than most Methodists. And all of that having to do with Bernie stories,” Smiddy said.
It wasn’t because Kenny was so well-known, but rather because he shared stories of her bravery and kindness, Smiddy said.
“When you earn the friendship of Bernie, then you’ve earned the right to share Bernie’s light with others,” Smiddy said. “She was a happy person. She could inspire you with joy.”
She also got what she wanted. In the late 1990s, Kenny learned about Remote Area Medical, a nonprofit provider of mobile medical clinics that brings health fairs to underserved communities around the country. At the time, the only dentist in Wise was about to retire and there was no replacement, said Dr. John Osborn, dental director of the organization.
The problem was that out-of-state health care workers could not legally practice in Virginia, barring Remote Area Medical from bringing in providers for its health fairs.
Kenny helped introduce state legislation that would allow health care workers from other states to provide charity care in Virginia. The legislation passed, and Remote Area Medical arrived in Wise. The health fairs there would become the largest in the country, Osborn said.
“We would literally have 100 dental chairs set up, and we would keep them full for three days. It was amazing,” Osborn said.
Just last weekend, Osborn participated in a seminar sponsored by the International College of Dentists. He was discussing humanitarian aid, so naturally, he flashed a picture of Kenny.
Kenny became an honorary member of the prestigious honors society in 2019 because of her contributions to rural health care and her advocacy for accessible dental care through her work with the Health Wagon, Osborn said.
Her list of accomplishments is long, but her most striking quality was her humility, according to Helton.
Helton described Kenny’s warm hugs and the way people would flock to her when her car with “be healed” posted to the back turned into the parking lot.
“Her life is a constant reminder that greatness isn’t defined by accolades or recognition, but kindness and love and service offered to others,” Helton said. “Her legacy is that. To love without condition, to give without expecting and to serve with humility.”
