Danilo Dobrilovic Endowment Fund
Danilo Dobrilovic was a long-time member of the Holy Resurrection Serbian Orthodox Cathedral. He was one of seven children of Stevo and Joka Dobrilovic, raised in Niksic, Kingdom of Yugoslavia in a traditional God fearing and Serbian nationalistic family. After high school he studied law in Beograd, where he was a member of Beli Orlovi (White Eagles) youth organization fighting against communists prior to WWII.
During the war he was a member of the Chetniks under Pavle Djurisic. He escaped Yugoslavia in 1944 when the communists took power and fled to Italy, where he lived in several refugee camps. In Italy, Danilo became a member of the Yugoslav army in exile as an assistant to the commander.
Danilo contracted tuberculosis in the refugee camps and was unable to emigrate with other Serbs after the war. He remained in Italy for 11 years working for the World Council of Churches.
In 1956, Danilo emigrated to Chicago to join 3 of his brothers. In Chicago, he worked several jobs until he resumed his studies at the University of Chicago, where in 1962 he received a Master of Business Administration in Accounting. After graduating, he worked for Ford Motor, Appleton Electric, and other companies as an accountant.
All his time in Chicago, he worked tirelessly at the Holy Resurrection Serbian Orthodox Cathedral. He volunteered his time and effort working on the church board, the church building committee, as a Serbian school teacher, and an advisor to church youth groups.
In the 1970’s, during the building of the new church on Redwood drive, Danilo led an effort to raise funds from parishioners so that the church could avoid commercial loans at a time when interest rates were skyrocketing due to economic uncertainty in the USA. Danilo appealed to parishioners to either donate money or lend it at no interest for construction of the new cathedral. Trusting parishioners agreed to donate or lend money to the church based on Danilo’s assurance that this money would be used only for construction of the new cathedral. The final loans to parishioners were paid in full in May 1986 at the Easter Banquet in the presence of the future Patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Irinej.
Danilo passed away from complications related to Leukemia two weeks later on May 19, 1986. He is survived by his wife Ljubica and son Stevan who are long time members of the church.
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