Br. Lucius James

Robert William Abell was born one of three sons, Robert, James and John, of James and Irene Cafferata Abell in September of 1924 in Chicago, Illinois.  He attended St. Timothy Grade School in Chicago and began his ninth grade at St. George High School.  Robert entered the Juniorate at La Salle Institute in Glencoe, Missouri, in 1939, after his freshman year at St. George, and upon his completion of his senior year in high school in Glencoe, he entered the Novitiate.  There he received the robe of the Brothers and the religious name of Brother Lucius James.  After a year of Novitiate he was assigned, in 1943, to the Scholasticate at St. Mary's College in Winona, Minnesota, where he received his bachelor's degree in May of 1946.  His first teaching assignment took him to Christian Brothers College in St. Louis in 1946 where he taught until January of 1948.  Brother Lucius James was then assigned to St. Mel High School in Chicago where he taught, was moderator of the Science Club and athletics.  He remained there until 1951 when he was reassigned to De La Salle High School in Kansas City, Missouri.  He spent the next six years there teaching, moderating athletics and supervising the cafeteria.  In 1957 Brother James was assigned to Helias High School in Jefferson City, Missouri.  He spent the remainder of his life in Jefferson City and was at Helias High School for forty-five of its forty-six years of existence and during that time taught, at one time or another, nearly every science and mathematics course offered at the school, and was rarely seen without his camera around his neck outside of school time.  He died of cancer on January 28, 2002, in Jefferson City at the age of seventy-eight, having been a De La Salle Christian Brother for over sixty years of his life.

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