Grieving parents honor son’s memory
When Frank Reali 3rd was found dead in his Staten Island real estate office a year ago this month, his parents pledged to do something in his honor to benefit the community.
What Francine (Fran) and Frank Reali came up with could transform high school sports in this town, maybe nationally.
The couple, owners of Safari Realty on Staten Island, wants to provide free magnetic resonance imaging scans for all students about to begin high school sports.
MRI scans provide noninvasive but remarkably accurate pictures of a patient’s body.
Produced by passing the patient through a powerful, often circular magnet, these photos can show even the tiniest injury or abnormality.
The younger Frank Reali was found dead in his Safari Realty office on April 29, 2006. He was 37 years old and the father of five.
His family endured a hellish month of not knowing the cause of his death before autopsy results disclosed the former standout Wagner High School football player had been felled by a congenital heart condition he had probably had since birth, his parents said.
“We still get people coming up to us saying they can’t believe he died,” Francine Reali said through tears.
“Five thousand people came to his wake over two days.”
What bothers the parents most is that there was never a hint that their son had any heart ailments, not before, during or after his high school sports years.
So on June 9, the Realis will host the first Frank J. Reali Memorial Dinner as a way to begin endowing the Frank J. Reali III Family Foundation.
One main foundation goal is to pay for MRIs for all high school students as part of mandatory physical exams taken before they can play on a school team.
The MRI scans would “at least let them know if they have a heart or other congenital problem,” Francine Reali said.
Dozens of schoolchildren of all ages die of undiagnosed heart problems around the country every year.
John Buzzard, a 15-year-old honor student at Brooklyn’s Xaverian High School, collapsed and died Jan. 18 from undiagnosed heart and brain ailments during a touch/tackle football game in Dyker Heights.
Seventeen-year-old Joe Costales, a wrestler at Staten Island’s McKee High School, suffered a massive heart attack and fell into a coma in October during a whiffle ball game – one week after getting a clean bill of health to join the school’s wrestling team.
Frank Reali said the benefit, scheduled for 7 p.m. June 9 at Ligreci’a Staaten catering hall on Staten Island and hosted by Tony Reali – a cousin and host of ESPN’s “Around the Horn” show, will also raise money for scholarships for Frank Reali 3rd’s children.
They also hope to establish scholarships for the children of other independent real estate agents, and plan to back an effort to start classes for high school children on the importance of estate planning, including health and life insurance and the need to write a will.
The evening will include auctions and silent auctions of some of the Realis’ extensive collection of sports memorabilia, which includes autographed footballs from all five New York Giants 1,000-yard rushers, team jerseys, helmets, baseballs and other mementos.
For more information about the memorial, call (718) 420-2331 or send an e-mail (realifoundation@aol.com).