The Tablet/1937/Charles A. Webber, a Splendid Layman

Charles A. Webber, a Splendid Layman. Dear Sir: The people of this diocese have just suffered a loss of a great Christian soul who served his God and Church and people's interest in a hundred ways. He had vigorous personality and was a part of all that he had met in many walk of life. He grew up in old St. Peter parish on Hicks Street and maintained that interest to the end although he had moved into St. Paul's parish and resided on Congress St. I refer to Charles Albert Webber, who was famed as a good and conservative lawyer in Brooklyn for more than 60 years last past, who had had much to do in establishing the Knights of Columbus in Brooklyn and the State of New York, and who had a wealth of wisdom to contribute to the purposes and operations of the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum Society, the Marquette League, the Catholic Summer School of America at Cliff Haven on Lake Champlain, New York, and he took a lot of satisfaction in a part he could play with fellow-citizens of Protestant, Jewish and Catholic faiths In what is known as the Good Will Symposium. Perhaps I knew him best as a trustee of the Brooklyn Public Library. The Mayor appointed him to that board In February 1918, to succeed the late John W. Devoy, who like his successor served 19 years as a reliable representative of the Catholic people in Brooklyn. Mr. Webber died on February 9, 1937, after having been chairman of the law committee of the Library Board from the outset of his service until the end. That involved a host of routine and incidental services of such a corporation having extensive interests in property rights and the administration of book service for a community of two and a half million Inhabitants. He also was on the administration committee which has to do with the personnel of the staff and an the human Interests that affect about 500 members of the staff. In this he came to be keenly alive to the unfair conditions that affected the staff in regard to their lack of pension rights, for which over a period of months recently and constantly to the extent of sheer abandon, he fought valiantly and tactfully and grace fully against considerate opposition to right a wrong. His patience and erudition … much to promote that cause … was an unselfish service, given generously and without a whimper. It fell to his lot to have presided at the last board meeting he attended a month ago. The board found him a wise and placid counsellor who well realized that discretion is he better part of valor. At Cliff Haven for years back he personally supervised the construction and decoration of an outdoor altar and stage where on August 15 the Feast of the Assumption of our Lady was enacted by clergy, children and people of the Summer school and their guests who came from far and wide up North, all edified-by his inspiration and devotion. On such stage he conducted a tableaux to depict in living characters the art of the Madonna paintings about which he wrote for your columns so copiously years ago. This was an expression of his innate refinement. He was a great soul who bore himself always humbly and cheerfully. We shall miss Charley Webber very much and it will be hard to find his compeer to carry on where he served so nobly. His family may well be proud of him. requiescat in pace! Francis J. Sullivan, Brooklyn, Feb. 14.