At the meeting after the April 8 Cal Poly baseball game, we honored two Brothers with the Flammae Custos award, the award being named for Fr. Jerome Cummings, made an Honorary Brother in 1966, passed away in 1997, who, almost five decades ago, single-handedly started our tradition of a yearly meeting to preserve and renew our ties.
Denny Blackburn has been committed to keeping our brotherhood alive for decades. Steve Yoss (F66), a prior Flammae Custos honoree and a pledge-brother of Denny’s, presented the award to him, telling people about Denny giving of his “time, talent and treasure.” Denny has given his time in attending almost all of our events over the close to 50 years we have been gathering annually. He has given of his talent as a successful businessman by serving on our Legacy Fund Board, now the Legacy Fund Committee, since its inception in 2008. And he has been our most consistent and generous donor to the Legacy Fund. More importantly, he embodies the brotherhood we have all benefited from and is committed to preserving it into the future. Denny, there with his wife Lynn and several members of his baseball-loving family, was touched, but he accepted the award with his typical humility, saying in part that he was raised to give back when you can and “it is better to be lucky than good,” and that he has been lucky.
Our second honoree was Robert Marshall (F66). It was an unconventional presentation because Robert, who had registered to attend the event with his wife Deborah, could not be there. In just the last few days before our event, Robert, who has previously shared that he is suffering from cancer, had experienced a dangerous drop in his blood counts after undergoing a new chemotherapy. His doctors told him he absolutely could not be around other people. So when he told us he could not be there, and since this award is always meant to be a surprise, we did what you might expect— we lied to him. We told him we were zooming the whole meeting at Brew Works and he could connect that way—which he did. And Jack surprised him by quickly launching into his presentation of the Flammae Custos award to Robert.
Jack told our group that Robert has for many years been committed to keeping our brotherhood alive. Until recently, Robert and Deborah lived on their ranch in Lockhart, Texas, which they sold because it became way too much to deal with in the face of his cancer. They moved back to LA a few months ago to a beautiful high-rise, where the above photo was taken. Robert was at all the early alumni gatherings when he was in the LA area, and, despite the geography, Robert traveled from Texas for many of the later ones. In addition, he is the person largely responsible for creating the PSC/SN Facebook page and preserving so many photos and historical documents there. And in the past year plus, he has been one of the people creating our website. Indeed, it would not have happened without his expertise and the many hours he devoted to that effort, even when he was simultaneously first figuring out and dealing with his cancer.
Like Denny, Robert very deeply treasures and embodies the brotherhood we enjoy and consistently over decades has done all that he can to help preserve and enhance it.
UPDATE 6/9/23:
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FLAMMAE CUSTOS MUG PRESENTATION
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When we presented our Flammae Custos awards [named in honor of Honorary Brother Fr. Jerome Cummings (Hon.-66; C.E.-97)] at our meeting after the April 8th baseball event, one of the honorees, Robert Marshall (F-66), was "zoomed" in because he could not be there in person due to a temporary complication related to treatment for the cancer he has been fighting the past year. Robert's name, along with the name of Dennis Blackburn (S-66), our other honoree that day, was added to the perpetual plaque that someday we hope will hang in a new Kappa Gamma house. But the award includes a cool mug, which Dennis received on April 8th. Today President Jack Carlino (F-67) presented Robert with his mug.
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