Salesian Br. Dave was a Shaw icon

    Salesian Brother Xavier Verrett, known by the Archbishop Shaw High School community as Brother Dave, died Jan. 3 at the Rehabilitation and Health Care Center of Tampa. He was 88 years old and had been a Salesian of Don Bosco for 63 years.
    A native of New Iberia, La., Brother Dave had lived in the Salesian retirement community in Tampa since 2011. After being orphaned, he grew up at Hope Haven in Marrero and entered the Salesian novitiate in 1948. He made his first profession of vows as a coadjutor brother in Newton, N.J., in 1949 and made his perpetual profession on June 6, 1955.
    From 1967-2009, he served at Archbishop Shaw High School in various capacities, managing the school bookstore for 40 years, caring for the gym, and doing carpentry and general maintenance.
    Shaw guidance counselor Cheryl Welch said he “was the hardest-working person I ever knew. He out-moved, out-lifted, outworked, and outmaneuvered the youngsters around him, and I am not talking just about the students. In most cases he was the hardest working Salesian on campus.”
      An oft-repeated refrain of his, usually directed to a student, was “Tell your momma you love her.”
    An avid coin collector, Brother Dave left his collection in Marrero when he moved to Tampa, and Salesian Father Louis Molinelli, director of the Marrero community, learned that it was worth more than $100,000. He used it to establish a scholarship fund in Brother Dave’s memory.
    On the occasion of his 50th anniversary of religious profession in 1999, one of the original Archbishop Shaw High School buildings was named Verrett Hall in his honor – the one where the old bookstore had been, of course.
    “Brother Dave loved community life,” said Salesian Father Thomas Rueckert.
    Brother Verrett’s funeral rites were celebrated at Mary Help of Christians Church in Tampa on Jan. 7 and at the Marian Shrine Chapel in Haverstraw, N.Y., on Jan. 9. Salesian Father Stephen Ryan, director of the Salesian community in Tampa, presided and preached there. At Haverstraw, Salesian Father Thomas Dunne, provincial, presided, and Salesian Father James McKenna, a former director of Archbishop Shaw, preached. Brother Dave was buried in the Salesian Cemetery in Goshen, N.Y., on Jan. 10. A memorial Mass was celebrated at Shaw Jan. 18.