Br. Leonard James

Peter J. Crowley was born at Graftonstown, West-Meath, Ireland on April 1, 1881, the son of John and Anne Fagan Crowley. After completing his elementary education he went to work to help his family. In 1906, at age twenty-five, he met Brother Adjutor and that same year, Peter entered the novitiate at Castletown and completed his novitiate at Glencoe, Missouri. He received the habit and religious name of Leonard James and upon completion of his year of novitiate he was assigned as a cook in the community at Bernallilo, New Mexico, in 1908. By 1913 he had completed his teaching examinations and was assigned as a teacher at Las Vegas and Bernallilo. He was assigned to California in 1916 and taught in St. Joseph's Academy in Berkeley and later in Walla Walla, Washington, From 1917 to 1925 he was assigned at St. Alphonsus in St. Louis, Missouri, and at St. Patrick's High School in Chicago, Illinois. He returned to California to teach at St. Peter's School in San Francisco in 1925 and Christian Brothers School in Sacramento in 1928. He died at the age of eighty-one, having been a De La Salle Christian Brother for fifty-five years.