Minium: ODU Football Booster, U.S. Marine and Police Captain Harry McBrien is an American hero

By Harry Minium

Harry McBrien smiles as he steers the Venture Tours bus down Interstate-64 toward the Norfolk Naval Base. Nearly 20 kids are in the bus, and while they are behaving, they're making a ton of noise.

They’re buzzing because they’re going on another adventure with Harry, this time they will tour an aircraft carrier, though most don’t know an aircraft carrier from a sailboat.

Harry has also taken these kids and others to an Old Dominion women’s basketball game, to meet ODU football coach Ricky Rahne, for a tour of ODU’s academic facilities and to see the Christmas lights along the Oceanfront. He wants to a busload to Norfolk State in the near future.

“I want these kids to know if they work hard and stay out of trouble, they can go to college and have a much better life,” he said, as the roar in the seats behind him amped up a few decibels.

To Harry, that noise is music. It warms his heart because many of these kids live in some of Virginia Beach’s poorest neighborhoods, near the Oceanfront, areas where the relationship between the police and residents have at times been strained.

McBrien has spent much of his life bridging that gap, fighting for his country and doing everything he can to help the athletic teams of his alma mater, Old Dominion University.

Hero is a word often overused by the media and by politicians But when you look at Harry’s life, his courage, his commitment to help others, you know he is indeed an American hero.

The Cox High School graduate joined the Marine reserves to help pay for college. He graduated from ODU in 1994 with a degree in political science. And the Marines then got their money’s worth from Harry.

Three times during his 28-year career with the Virginia Beach police he was activated by the Marines and deployed to war zones.

He doesn’t talk much about his deployments, but he received four medals and commendations.

As a police officer, he worked for narcotics, as an undercover cop, as a recruiter and police academy instructor and with the SWAT team before he was named a captain. In 2021, he was assigned to the Second Precinct, where he was tasked with trying to quell increasing violence in and near the city’s biggest economic asset, the Oceanfront.

He instituted a policy of community policing, in which officers focused as much on making friends as chasing down criminals. He sent officers out to meet with residents and listen to their problems. He would muster his officers in the field rather than at the precinct so they would be visible.

He created new relationships in neighborhoods where cops hadn't always been appreciated. Police came to neighborhoods such as Seatack, Atlantis, Friendship Village and Colony Trailer Park to bring Kona Ice Trucks to serve kids cold treats on hot days.

His new policies helped change peoples’ lives.

Upon his recent retirement from the police in June, the Virginia Beach City Council adopted a resolution in his honor that read in part, “Under his supervision, violence at the Oceanfront was drastically reduced by over eighty percent in a three-year period.”

Harry and his wife, Diana, a teacher at Norfolk’s Larrymore Elementary School, have also made a huge impact many areas of ODU’s athletics program. In some ways, they are the unsung heroes of ODU athletics.

“Harry is one of the biggest fans we have,” said Jena Virga, executive director of the Old Dominion Athletic Foundation. “They are huge football fans. I wish we had more people like Harry and Diana. They just love the program, win or lose.”

They have been ODU fans for decades and football season ticket holders since the program began in 2009. Harry purchased tickets for that first season even though he knew he would be deployed to Iraq.

“I wanted to make sure that I had tickets,” he said.  

A few years later they heard a presentation about ODAF’s Legacy Society, which focuses on enticing people to include ODU as a beneficiary in their wills. Once the meeting ended, they were all-in.

Harry has since written ODU into his will and he and Diana now co-chair the society. Together, they have helped raise more than $4 million that will be added to ODU’s athletic endowment.

Harry and Diana have a daughter named Lauren but no son. “This way, the McBrien name will continue on as part of an endowed scholarship,” Harry said.

And that’s just the start of their involvement. Harry was among the founding members of the Monarchists, a group of ODU fans who informally came together to tailgate before football games, but evolved into something of a Monarch booster club.

The group went beyond tailgating and got on social media “because we felt like we needed to be a positive force for ODU and ODU athletics. We saw some negative things online and wanted to counteract that,” Harry said.

The Monarchists now have a web site and a podcast and have a deal to help promote The Pride of ODU, a collective which compensates players for their name, image and likeness.

Do you think it's cool when a Navy Jet or Marine helicopter does a flyover before a football game at S.B. Ballard Stadium? You can thank Harry, who negotiates with all branches of the military to bring aircraft to ODU.

Several years ago, Harry and the Monarchists began promoting the Toys for Tots campaign, a Marine charity that collects toys and money to purchase toys for needy kids at Christmas. It began with a few boxes for people to drop off toys and has since morphed into something much bigger.

Once per year, uniformed Marines circulate through the tailgate areas collecting toys. Harry has persuaded the Marines to bring several vehicles, including an amphibious assault vehicle last season.

Last season, hundreds of fans climbed on board and took photographs and donated enough to help 400 children have a much merrier Christmas.

“This is very near and dear to Harry’s heart,” Diana said. “He loves children, and he worries about those who go without.”

Whether they are in Virginia Beach or Africa. While deployed in a war zone, he helped promote Flip Flops for Foreign Friends, which provided shoes to African children. Their daughter, Lauren, was also involved with Flip Flps for Foreign Friends at Strawbridge Elementary School. 

During football season, Monday nights are reserved for Harry and Diana to attend Rahne's weekly radio show. They are usually among the first to arrive and last to leave.

“If you listen to Ricky's show on the radio, you can always hear Harry leading the crowd in cheering,” said Mike Langston, one of the original members of the Monarchists. “He’s always the first to begin clapping and cheering.”

Enthusiastic? Years ago, when ODU played at old Foreman Field, Harry was seen wearing camouflage shorts, an ODU jersey and a hard hat walking from section to section leading fans in cheers.

“Harry McBrien is just awesome,” Rahne said. “He loves ODU, he loves our football program. He and his wife are always there and always positive.”

Carolyn Crutchfield, executive senior associate athletic director for sports administration and external affairs, said that Harry is invaluable to ODU as a contact with the military.

“Military people sometimes speak a different language, and Harry is able to navigate those waters for us,” she said. “The military is a group we’ve really been trying to engage.

“He absolutely loves ODU. All he wants to do is give back.

“There’s no self-promotion here. He doesn’t want any recognition. All he wants to do is help.”

That was apparent on a hot June day when Harry pulled the Venture Tours Bus into a parking lot adjacent to a pier at the Norfolk Naval Station. The kids in the bus were mesmerized by the sight of the U.S.S. Gerald Ford, the world’s largest aircraft carrier.

Harry stood back during the tour and let Navy personnel take the lead role.

He was accompanied by five other Virginia Beach Police officers, who tagged each child as they were brought onto the bus and then fed them food donated by Zeroes Subs. Harry has a special knack for persuading businesses to donate, including Jimmy Hall, the owner of Venture Tours, who donated use of the bus.

We were met at the pier by former ODU football player Jude Brenya, whom Harry took under his wing and mentored him when he joined the police. He is now a Virginia Beach Police public information office.

“What a great guy,” Brenya said as the kids scrambled up the gangplank. “He’s got such a big heart.”

The kids are given a 90-minute tour from the mess hall to the bridge, where they are captivated as a young female sailor, certainly not more than 20, tells them about how she steers the 97,000-ton ship with a crew of 5,500 and nearly 80 fighter jets.

“How can I get your job?” one child asks. “Do your school work and then enlist in the Navy,” she replied.

Their last stop is the flight deck, where the kids huddled underneath a jet for a few minutes and took in the view of the Norfolk harbor and naval base from 25 stories high.

Charmaine Dunbar, a Virginia Beach mother who has two children who took the tour, said “that trips like this open up their minds to new possibilities. I’m so grateful the police are doing this kind of thing.”

Though he’s an unsung hero at ODU, Harry is a bit of a legend in Virginia Beach. Thin Brew Line Brewry (a takeoff on the Thin Blue Line reference to police) sells a honey brown ale knows as “Dirty Harry.” 

Since retiring from the Marines in 2010 and the police this summer, Harry says he has too much spare time on his hands. Working with ODU helps fill his days.

“It keeps me mission oriented,” he said. “I still get to be involved with the military and support my alma mater.

“I want ODU to succeed. And I want the military to succeed. We live in a military town. I met my wife when I lived in military housing.

“This is our way of continuing to support two institutions that we truly love. Old Dominion University and our nation’s military.”

 Minium is ODU’s senior executive writer. Contact him at hminium@odu.edu or follow him on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram