Identical twins Julian and Adrian Riester were born seconds apart 92 years ago. They died hours apart this week.
The brothers, born in Buffalo, New York, were also brothers in the Roman Catholic Order of Friars Minor. Professed friars for 65 years, they spent much of that time working together at St Bonaventure University, doing carpentry work, gardening and driving visitors to and from the airport and around town.
“It was fun to see them, just quiet, gentle souls,” said Yvonne Peace, who worked at the St Bonaventure Friary for nearly 21 years.
They died on Wednesday at St Anthony Hospital in St Petersburg, Florida, Brother Julian in the morning and Brother Adrian in the evening.
Both died of heart failure, said Father James Toal, guardian of St Anthony Friary in St Petersburg, where the inseparable twins lived since moving from western New York in 2008.
“It really is almost a poetic ending to the remarkable story of their lives,” St Bonaventure spokesman Tom Missel said. “Stunning when you hear it, but hardly surprising given that they did almost everything together.”
Julian and Adrian Riester were born Jerome and Irving on March 27, 1919, to a couple who already had five daughters. They took the names of saints upon their ordination in the Catholic Church.
“Dad was a doctor and he said a prayer for a boy,” Adrian once said, according to St Bonaventure. “The Lord fooled him and sent two.”
After attending St Joseph’s Collegiate Institute, the brothers were turned away by the military because of their eyesight, the university said. One had a bad left eye, the other a bad right eye.
Eventually they joined the friars of Holy Name Province in New York City. They received separate assignments before reuniting at the seminary at St Bonaventure from 1951 to 1956. After serving parishes in Buffalo for 17 years, they returned to St Bonaventure in 1973 and spent the next 35 years there.
They had separate rooms in the friary, but one telephone extension that rang into both, Peace said. It was usually the more talkative Adrian who answered, though Julian possessed a quiet authority. They never said who was born first.
“Brother Julian was like the big brother. Brother Adrian would defer to him,” Peace said.
Funeral services are scheduled for tomorrow at St Mary Our Lady of Grace Church in St Petersburg. Afterward, the brothers’ bodies will be flown to Buffalo and buried on Wednesday at St Bonaventure Cemetery, across the street from the university.
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Tuesday declared martial law in an unannounced late night address broadcast live on YTN television. Yoon said he had no choice but to resort to such a measure in order to safeguard free and constitutional order, saying opposition parties have taken hostage of the parliamentary process to throw the country into a crisis. "I declare martial law to protect the free Republic of Korea from the threat of North Korean communist forces, to eradicate the despicable pro-North Korean anti-state forces that are plundering the freedom and happiness of our people, and to protect the free
France on Friday showed off to the world the gleaming restored interior of Notre-Dame cathedral, a week before the 850-year-old medieval edifice reopens following painstaking restoration after the devastating 2019 fire. French President Emmanuel Macron conducted an inspection of the restoration, broadcast live on television, saying workers had done the “impossible” by healing a “national wound” after the fire on April 19, 2019. While every effort has been made to remain faithful to the original look of the cathedral, an international team of designers and architects have created a luminous space that has an immediate impact on the visitor. The floor shimmers and
CHAGOS ISLANDS: Recently elected Mauritian Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam told lawmakers that the contents of negotiations are ‘unknown’ to the government Mauritius’ new prime minister ordered an independent review of a deal with the UK involving a strategically important US-UK military base in the Indian Ocean, placing the agreement under fresh scrutiny. Under a pact signed last month, the UK ceded sovereignty of the Chagos archipelago to Mauritius, while retaining control of Diego Garcia — the island where the base is situated. The deal was signed by then-Mauritian prime minister Pravind Jugnauth and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Oct. 3 — a month before elections in Mauritius in which Navin Ramgoolam became premier. “I have asked for an independent review of the
LAOS: The bars of bustling Vang Vieng remain open, but information on the investigation into the deaths of six backpackers from suspected methanol poisoning is scarce The music is still playing and the alcohol is still flowing at the bars along one of the party streets in Vang Vieng. Inside a popular venue, a voice over the speaker announces a special offer on beers, as disco lights flicker on the floor. Small paper flags from nations across the world — from the UK to Gabon — hang from the ceiling. Young people travel from all corners of the globe to party in the small town nestled in the Laos countryside, but Vang Vieng is under a global spotlight, following a suspected mass methanol poisoning that killed six
RSS