Br. Justinus Elzear

Brother Elzear entered the Brothers while a student at Cretin High School in St. Paul, Minneapolis. He spent his early teaching career, 1903 to 1910, in St. Louis, Missouri, at St. Vincent's School, St. Bridget's School and Christian Brothers College High School. In 1911 he and Brother Icarion were sent to Winona, Minnesota, to open Cotter High School and in 1913 he moved to De La Salle High School in Chicago. He earned his B.A. degree from CBC St. Louis in 1914 and his M.A. from DePaul University in Chicago in 1924. Brother Elzear served as Director of his alma mater, Cretin High School, from 1916 to 1923 and in 1919 he was instrumental in procuring the first R.O.T.C. unit at Cretin and later (in 1933) a unit at CBC, St. Louis. He served as Director at De La Salle, Chicago, Illinois, and opened St. George High School in Evanston, Illinois. Illness caused him to relinquish his duties at CBC St. Louis in 1935. He gave the first three Thirty-Day retreats of the St. Louis District and was an accomplished orator and after dinner speaker. Brother Justinus Elzear died at age fifty-seven in his forty-third year as a De La Salle Christian Brother