Dom Savio HS Holds "Great Savio Reunion"

Dom Savio High School
Holds “Great Savio Reunion”


Caselli Hall, the main school building of St. Dominic Savio HS and Savio Prep
An estimated 450 former students and faculty of St. Dominic Savio HS and Savio Prep in East Boston showed up for the Great Savio Reunion on Saturday night, March 10, at what is now the Salesian Boys & Girls Club of East Boston. The SDBs operated Dom Savio from 1958 to 1993. A group of alumni set up Savio Prep a couple of years later and ran it until 2007.

There were even a few alumni of Don Bosco Trade School, which preceded Dom Savio at the site (1946-1955) before relocating to downtown Boston as Don Bosco Tech.

The reunion was planned over the course of several months by alumni Steve Fielding and Fr. John Nazzaro, both of the Class of 1972. Steve is now the director of development and communications for the Boys & Girls Club, and Fr. John is executive director as well as director of the local community of four SDBs who serve at the Club.

The event invited "alumni, former teachers, administrators, and coaches of both schools to attend and renew acquaintances, recapture memories, and rebuild relationships." Steve and Fr. John also hoped that interest in the current Boys & Girls Club would be stirred, including "the club's impact on youth in the East Boston, Revere, and Winthrop communities."
Fr. John said that about 280 alumni and staff had indicated that they would come, and more were expected. More, indeed! Volunteers registering participants at the front desk had 400 name tags, and they ran out. More seriously, downstairs in the kitchen they were running out of liquid refreshments!

Steve and Fr. John had arranged for a band, the North Shore’s Hardest Working Band, made up of Savio alums (Chris Snow ’84; Joe Maraio ’98, Vinny Schettino ’04, and others), to perform on the stage in the gym. Unfortunately for the Hardest Working Band, about 98% of the crowd preferred to stay down in the old cafeteria, working on the free sandwiches and plates of fruit and veggies, and staying close to beer, soda, and water at the cash bar.
The Voice of the (“17-time NBA champion”) Celtics, Eddie Palladino ’75 (above, center), welcomed everyone to the evening and credited Dom Savio with giving him a chance to develop his announcing skills. Then he introduced Fr. John (above with mike), who likewise made everyone feel at home. That was the end of the speechifying, which was a good thing because not many people were listening, not even when the winner of the 50-50 raffle was announced around 10:00 p.m.
The alumni and staff spent most of the four hours of the evening—actually, it went longer than the announced 11:00 p.m. closing time—talking with one another, catching up on families and careers, reminiscing about school days, and asking about some of the Salesians they’d known. Many of them voiced their deep appreciation for what the Salesians and other faculty had taught them, and not only in an academic sense. There were a lot of fond memories of Fr. Joe Caselli, Bro. George Sheehan, Fr. Don Zarkoski, Fr. Pat Diver, and many others.

If there had been a prize for the participant who traveled the farthest to get to the Great Reunion, the winner, hands down, would have been former SDB brother Pat Whalen, who did his practical training at Savio, 1968-1971, and came all the way from Brisbane, Australia, to catch up with some of his former students (and with former SDBs Tom Lennon, who taught at Savio, and George Stanton, who attended Savio). Pat moved “down under” shortly after leaving the SDBs and had a 40-year teaching career in both public and Catholic schools.

The Class of 1977 claimed the biggest representation at the evening, with at least 17 attendees—not counting their freshman dean/English teacher, who came up from New Rochelle for the evening. Big question from them: "How old were you when you taught us? Only 24! Wow!" (Boy, are freshmen green!)
Most of the Class of 1977 who were in attendance, with your humble blogger