Br. Julian Austin

Richard Mathias Schwaab was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on January 27, 1907, the son of Charles and Theresa Steffens Schwaab, and was one of ten children. His father was a baker by trade and young Richard attended St. Boniface Grade School and began high school at St. John's College Prep School in Collegeville, Minnesota. He became ill and shortly returned home to attend De La Salle High School on Nicolet Island where he first met the Christian Brothers. Richard entered the Glencoe Juniorate on January 29, 1924, at Glencoe, Missouri and on August 30, 1924, he received the habit of the Brothers and the religious name of Brother Julian Austin as he began his Novitiate. His first year of Scholasticate came at Glencoe and continued in 1926 at DePaul University in Chicago where in 1928 he received his B.A. degree. Brother Julian Austin's first teaching assignment was at De La Salle High School in Chicago, where he had done his practice teaching and where he could continue his master's degree work at DePaul from where he received his M.A. in 1930. In 1934 he was assigned to St. George High School in Evanston, Illinois, and a year later he was assigned to Christian Brothers High School in St. Louis, Missouri. He served there for fourteen years as teacher, office manager, Sub-Director and Assistant Principal. In 1952 he was named Director and Principal of De La Salle Academy in Kansas City, Missouri, where he served until 1956. In 1956 Brother Austin founded the unique La Salle Procure in Chicago, Illinois, and served as its head for twenty years, saving dioceses, schools and the Brothers millions of dollars through his shrewd business abilities. He continued to take graduate courses at Manhattan College in New York, as well as Minneapolis and Kansas City. In the summer of 1976 Austin's health began to fail and he was assigned to work at the National Office in Lockport, Illinois, while in residence at St. Patrick's Residence. He died in August at the age of seventy, having been a De La Salle Christian Brother for fifty-six years