Br. Jerome De La Salle

Vincent Leonard Beck was born on August 17, 1917, in Kansas City, Missouri, the son of Thomas and Clara Beck, and one of six natural siblings and an adopted brother. Vincent entered the Juniorate in February of 1930 and the Novitiate in 1933, where he received the habit and religious name of Brother Jerome De La Salle. After completing his Scholasticate training he was assigned to teach Latin and algebra at St. Mel High School in Chicago, Illinois. A year later he was assigned to the Glencoe Juniorate where he remained until 1945 when he went to Christian Brothers College in St. Louis, Missouri. In 1945 he taught and was Sub-Director at St. George High School in Evanston, Illinois, and in 1947 he was appointed Director at CBC in St. Joseph, Missouri. He returned to St. George in 1950 as Director but was named Principal of De La Salle in Manila, Philippines, in 1952. He returned to the states in 1958 and was assigned to Christian Brothers College High School in St. Joseph, Missouri, for two years before being assigned to De La Salle High School in Chicago in 1960. Unable at the time to cope with Vatican II changes in religious life, he requested and received a dispensation in September of 1966. "Although he was separated from the Brothers, he never really left them." He sought readmission to the Brothers in the spring of 1982 and professed his vows on May 12, 1982. In August cancer took his life and he was buried in the family plot in Kansas City next to his parents. He was sixty-five years old and had been, in his heart, a De La Salle Christian Brother for fifty-two years and as a member of the Institute for almost thirty seven years.