BRO. SAMUEL GRESOCK of the Province of Cincinnati died in the service of the Blessed Virgin Mary on August 18, 1999, in Dayton, Ohio, in the 85th year of his age and the 65th year of his religious profession.

  Samuel Joseph Gresock was born in Sagamore, Pennsylvania on August 17, 1915 as Simeon Joseph and baptized at St Peter and Paul Greek Catholic Church in Punxytawney.  Sam was always called Sam, so the priest must have written Simeon. He took Joseph as his religious name and then a few years later his brother
Joseph age 16  drowned, so he felt it would hurt his mother so he asked to
go back to Sam and has been ever since.

 He entered the postulate at Marianist Preparatory School in Dayton, Ohio in 1931 and graduated from there in 1934 when he entered the Novitiate. He professed his First Vows on August 15, 1935, at Dayton, and Perpetual Vows on July 16, 1939 at Honolulu, Hawaii, and received a B.S. in Education from the University of Dayton (1951).

In his early years of Marianist life he served as an elementary school teacher at St. Joseph School in San Francisco (1936-37), Cathedral School (1937-1940)and St. Louis College (1940-42; 1946) in Honolulu, St. Anthony School(1942-45) in Wailuku, St. John's Home in Brooklyn and Rockaway, New York(1946-47; 195359), Immaculate Conception School in Washington, DC (1947-48;1949-53), and Colegio San Jose in San Juan, Puerto Rico (1948-49). At the time of the sixtieth anniversary of his vows, his subtle humor was manifested as he recalled an incident in his first community. "When we left Mount St. John we were given shirts with plastic collars. The collars were irritating, and one Brother from San Francisco begged the director for permission to buy cloth collars. Not only did we get new cloth collars, but then he went around demanding all the plastic collars be given to him for a ceremonial burning As the smoke ascended into the air, we all knew it was the last time we would wrap a plastic collar around our neck!"

From 1959 on Brother Gresock served in Ohio, mainly in Dayton, as a chauffeur and maintenance worker at Mount Saint John (1959-67), postmaster and chauffeur at the University of Dayton (1967-73), maintenance worker at Governor's Island at Indian Lake (1974-78), and Marianist Mission employee in Dayton (1978-9

Recently, his final illness required him to transfer from the Marianist, Alumni Hall Community at the University of Dayton to the Franciscan at St. Leonard.

A simple man, Brother Sam dedicated himself to whatever ministry he was assigned. He evidenced an unfeigned tenderness particularly in caring for his mother during her final illness and in his devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary

Sam entered the Society of Jesus (Dayton, Ohio) as a brother.  He was teaching in Hawaii when Pearl Harbor was bombed in World War II, and due to the war situation was unable to come back to the mainland US until after the war ended.  When he came back, he bought various exotic items like grass skirts back for the family.

The picture below shows Sam (middle) with his mother Ellen, Al Margetta, Sr. Ellen Gresock, Sr. Adalaide Sargent and John Gresock at his sister's Mary Helen's funeral in 1974.

The picture below shows Samuel with his mother and siblings (approx 1920). From left: John Jr., Joseph (baby sitting on mother), Ellen Kuzma Gresock (mother), Ethel (hands-folded), Samuel, Ellen, Mary.