INTRODUCTION I only knew one of my grandfathers, my Mother’s father John (Yanni) Pagonis. My other grandfather, Stephen (Stephanos) John (Yanni) Frangos, after whom I’m named, lived his entire life in Greece and I never saw him. The reason I’m writing this is because I wish I knew more about my grandfathers and feel that someday my grandchildren may wish to know more about me too. In fact, a few years ago while on a trip, Samantha, Stephen and Matthew suggested that I do this and gave me some ideas about what I could write about. They told me what they wondered about me and the “olden days”, so I’ve included what I remember. Also, I do have some pictures of my early years that you might enjoy. Now I have the advantage of knowing all of you. Sadly we lost Samantha this year (my heart will be forever broken) but Stephen, Matthew, Anabel, Tess, Tommy, and Drew are all my pride and joys in life and I do love all of you. One other thing before I start telling you what I remember. When I was in college in 1954 my Papou, the one I knew of course, was ill and not expected to live……about 60 yrs ago. Before I learned of his death from my family, I had a vision in my dorm room…….like a ghost…… of him coming to say good bye before he left for heaven. Years later Aunt Stephanie told me that she saw a ghostlike appearance of my father, your Mothers’ Papou , in her dorm room at college saying good bye to her before he left for heaven. I had not shared my vision with Aunt Stephanie until she told me hers. Now isn’t that amazing!!!! EARLY YEARS
Transcript
INTRODUCTION
I only knew one of my grandfathers, my Mother’s father John (Yanni) Pagonis. My other grandfather, Stephen (Stephanos) John (Yanni) Frangos, after whom I’m named, lived his entire life in Greece and I never saw him.
The reason I’m writing this is because I wish I knew more about my grandfathers and feel that someday my grandchildren may wish to know more about me too. In fact, a few years ago while on a trip, Saman-tha, Stephen and Matthew suggested that I do this and gave me some ideas about what I could write about. They told me what they wondered about me and the “olden days”, so I’ve included what I re-member. Also, I do have some pictures of my early years that you might enjoy.
Now I have the advantage of knowing all of you. Sadly we lost Samantha this year (my heart will be for-ever broken) but Stephen, Matthew, Anabel, Tess, Tommy, and Drew are all my pride and joys in life and I do love all of you.
One other thing before I start telling you what I remember. When I was in college in 1954 my Papou, the one I knew of course, was ill and not expected to live……about 60 yrs ago. Before I learned of his death from my family, I had a vision in my dorm room…….like a ghost……of him coming to say good bye before he left for heaven. Years later Aunt Stephanie told me that she saw a ghostlike appearance of my father, your Mothers’ Papou , in her dorm room at college saying good bye to her before he left for heaven. I had not shared my vision with Aunt Stephanie until she told me hers. Now isn’t that amazing!!!!
EARLY YEARS
I was born in Martins Ferry, Ohio on Jan 23, 1936. I was told that there was a big flood about then. My parents were John (Yanni) Stephen (Stephanos) Frangos and Virginia (Evyenia) Pagonis Frangos. They had both been born in Greece on the is-land of Chios in the Village of Kardamlya. They came to the US at different times and located in Ohio near relatives. Family friends introduced them and they were married there.
I have an older sister Betty (Aspasia) and you know her as Aunt Betty. An older brother, Stephen John was born earlier but died as an infant. Aunt Betty and I never knew him. Isn’t that sad. So I was the second Stephen (Stephanos) for my parents.
It is tradition in Greek culture to name the first son of the first son after the grandfa-ther, so that is why I am Stephen (Stephanos) John (Yanni) Frangos after my pater-nal grandfather. Since Nana and I didn’t have any sons we were not able to carry on the tradition.
When I was very young, about 2, we moved to Uniontown, PA where I grew up and lived until I went to college. We lived on 51R Lincoln St. and I remember very little and don’t have any photos. Aunt Betty was older and remembers more so she’s been a big help in telling my story. While there, my brother, George, was born when I was 5. My Aunt Thelma, one of my Mother’s sisters, and her husband Uncle Charlie (Harambolos) and our cousins, their children, George and Koula, lived nearby and were our closest relatives.
World War II was going on while we lived there and that was a very sad and stress-ful time. I remember practice air raid drills and many things like food, shoes, gaso-line were rationed and in very short supply. We had a “victory garden” where we grew lots of our food and I remember tomatoes, corn, peppers, melons, etc. One in-cident I remember (or was talked about so that’s how I remember) was that I was impatient for the tomatoes to be ready to pick so my father placed some that were bought from the store near the plants so I was fooled and very pleased.
Also, I had a puppy named Sparky and pet rabbits…lots of them since they repro-duced rapidly.
After the war was over we learned that my Aunt Irene, my Mother’s youngest sister, had died while the Germans had occupied Chios. As you can imagine, my Mother was devastated. I never met her so only knew Aunt Thelma and Aunt Mary, my Mother’s other sister who lived with us for a while. In the late 40’s after the war was over, my Mother’s parents moved to Uniontown and that’s how I got to know two of my grandparents.
We then moved to a bigger house on the same street, 267 Lincoln St. (Isn’t it interesting that Nana too lived in two houses on the same street in Westwood, NJ, Kinderkamack Rd.)
I have many memories from 267 and some pictures too which I will share. Your Moms all spent time there visiting my family. Another garden (bigger), grape vines, rhubarb, a yard for games and our hammock, the alley where we played ball until the sun went down, marble pits, places to ride our
bikes. We had loads of good times and much fun. I shared a room with my brother George and Aunt Betty had her own room. My grandparents lived with us for a while. They were Yanni and Stamatia Pagonis, my Papou and Yaya.
I had another dog, Perky, lots of chickens and some more rabbits, we even had a lamb which we shared with our cousins in their yard. That’s a very sad story and I can’t write about it, but might tell you all about it sometime in person. A bike named Radar…..my pride and best possession. We went to movies, cowboy ones were my favorite. Roy Rogers, Hopalong Cassidy, Gene Autry, The Lone Ranger, The Durango Kid (his horse was Radar) etc. were my heroes and movies cost 15c. We saved our pennies for comic books like Captain Marvel, Superman, Blondie, Batman and Robin etc. which cost 10c. Bubble gum came with a baseball card for 1c and most candy was also 1c. Marbles, riding bikes, playing ball capturing lighting bugs and hide and go seek were my favorite pastimes.
Believe it or not….it’s true, we didn’t have TV until 1952, I was 16. No computers or I-phones but we did have dial up phones and had to share them with other people….they were called “party lines”. And we did have a radio and listened to it all the time. The Pirate games were my favorite and there were many shows like Jack Benny, The Shadow, Mr. Kean tracer of lost persons, Your Hit Parade etc.
My first school was Gallatin Grade School. Aunt Betty went first and since we only spoke Greek at home, she taught me English. I started in 1941. I have some pictures of what I looked like then. In 1945 after we moved, I went to Park Grade School for 5th and 6th grades.
I was a patrol boy and helped other children cross the street. I wore a badge on a holster and had a long pole with a flag on the end to stop the cars. One of the nice things about being a patrol boy was that I got to go on a bus trip to our country’s Capitol, Washington, DC. This was the longest trip that I had ever taken, and the first time I was away from my family. It was a lot of fun. We saw the Capitol, White House, lots of monuments, the US Mint and Treasury, and went to a Major League baseball game between the Washington Senators and Philadelphia Athletics. Sorry, no pictures but I remem-ber it very well even though I was 12 yrs old.
I played the trumpet from the 5th to 9th grades and was in the school bands. I loved the parades best and my best song was “TAPS”.
For 7th, 8th and 9th grades I attended Lafayette Jr. High School which was next to Park. We walked to school (there were no busses and we didn’t have a car) in all kinds of weather.
Then it was on to Uniontown High School for 10th, 11th and 12th grades. I was a good student, mostly As and a few Bs and made the National Honor Society. Although I was very interested in sports, I did not play on any school teams.
Our big trip was when I was a senior and we went to New York City by bus with a Theater Apprecia-tion Group. Although that was over 60 yrs ago, I remember every detail like it was yesterday. We saw many plays, went to Radio Center Music Hall, took the boat around Manhattan, went up the Em-pire State Bldg and much more. We had to earn the money for the trip and I sold hot dogs, popcorn, etc at the Fri. night football games
I tell you about my Father’s restaurant and my work there in another part of this but I had another job delivering papers. I helped an older friend of mine, George Mauler, deliver papers in our neighbor-hood. The paper was called The Evening Standard and no longer exists. The other paper, The Morn-ing Herald still publishes and Aunt Betty worked for both of them for many years. Delivering papers was hard work and collecting money from the customers had to be done every week. There were some mean dogs who didn’t like paper boys very much on our route. My friend and I (with lots of help from his parents) saved enough to buy a car. It was really his because I wasn’t old enough when I was in 11th grade. The car was a black, as were most cars back then, 1936 Chevy and we called it “The Goose”. Gas cost 12c per gallon and we had much fun riding all over the place.
When I was in 11th grade/16 yrs old and got my driver’s license my Father bought a car for the family. It was a 1952 Pontiac two tone blue beauty called “The Silver Streak”. We went on family trips and fi-nally had both a car AND a TV. We were in the modern times!!
My first girlfriend’s name was Patty and in the tradition of those days went “steady”. Patty and I de-cided to not be boy & girl friends when we went off to different colleges, she to Vassar and I to Carnegie Tech. She was very nice and very smart but she wasn’t nearly as pretty or as much fun as Nana. We are still friends after all these years.
As my years in Uniontown came to a close, I remember them as a great place to have lived. Once I left for college in the Fall of 1953 I only came as a “sort of” visitor but have many fond memories of grow-ing up there as I went from a boy to a young man. It is a big part of my life.
TASTY LUNCH
Tasty Lunch was my Father’s restaurant. I spent many hours there and learned lots of things…..about how to work hard, cook food, serve customers and most impor-tantly, all about various kinds of people and what makes them tick.
TL was long and narrow with booths down one side and counters and stools in the middle. The Restrooms were in the back behind the booths. There was a grill near the entrance and a refrigerator, freezer, coffee maker opposite the counter. The kitchen with stove and food prep counter and sinks were in the back as was the supply room. A steam table along the wall stored the food ready for serving.
When I was about nine ( I was in 4th or 5th grade and it was about 1945) I could barely reach the sink…with the help of a step stool, I had my first job….washing dishes, glasses and pots and pans. I also swept the floors, peeled potatoes etc. For the next 7-8 years until I left for college in 1953, I learned how to do all the many jobs including cooking and even opening and closing the place sometime. I worked most days for at least a few hours and long hours on Saturday and some Sundays when we were open.
The restaurant was on Peter St. in Uniontown’s downtown area. It was the business hub and was always bustling. There were other places to eat, bars, shoe repair shops, a grocery store, a bowling alley, a hotel, barber shops, etc . A fairly large Sears Roebuck department store was on the same block and nearby was the street-car station (that was how most people got around then). Also nearby were three movie theaters, The State, The Penn, and The Manos and a 5 & 10 cent store, Mur-phys. We were opened 7 days a week until Dad decided to close on Sundays. No doubt Saturdays was our BIG day since Uniontown was the center of the smaller coal mining towns of Fayette County and almost everyone came to town to shop, do other errands…..and have a good time. There were about 20,000 people who lived in Uniontown and about 50,000 who lived in Fayette County in these days.
Our supplies were either delivered or came from the grocery store/”super” market , Streamline, which was next door. It wasn’t very big or fancy but everyone knew ev-eryone and Dad had running tabs so it was quick. Ike Kidonov was the produce man and John the meat guy. Billy Frankos (not related but he was Greek) ran the gro-cery part. I made frequent trips next door as needed. There was an A & P, real su-permarket, a few blocks away where we went for special and bulk items. Also, there was an Italian food store that had many of the things Dad liked and needed but he didn’t care for the owner so we went there as little as possible. A produce wholesale place was located near the train station (now a good restaurant) near the streetcar station.
Deliveries included: ice, milk, and baked goods daily, pop, beer weekly and candy, ice cream, cigarettes, cigars etc every so often but they all were on call if we ran out of anything and needed a rush delivery.
Of course there was no A/C and it got hot in the summer. We had two fans….one was a large exhaust fan on the roof. It had to be greased frequently, a job I hated since it was very dirty and messy. The other one was a ceiling fan that was like an airplane (green) that blew lots of air down the length of the place.
There was a juke box….5c a song 6 for 25c. Most of the songs were what I called “hillbilly” or in today’s terms “country western”. They were the most popular and played frequently but I didn’t care much for them preferring the Pop songs by Frank Sinatra, Perry Como, Dean Martin, Patti Page, etc. I got to know how to play the songs I liked for free but wasn’t allowed to when customers were paying for the “hill-billy” stuff. Needless to say, I played only the Pop songs. Dad shared the income from the juke box 50/50 with the owner who provided the records (they were 78s at first then 45s later……no 33s) and the maintenance. They counted the coins to-gether before they split the proceeds and sometimes I got to help them.
The cash register was in front and people paid as they left. It was a manual, push button National Cash Register. All the money flowed in (and out to pay for the sup-plies) . We kept good records of what we spent and tallied the money daily at the end of the day. I learned how to do the bookkeeping pretty well and by the time I graduated from High School even did the income taxes.
When I left for college in the fall of 1953, my brother, George, took over these many duties I had.
I often worked after school when I was in HS. I remember doing my homework when it was quiet. Also remember going a block up to Main Street for The Evening Standard paper (later Aunt Betty worked for the two papers…the other on is The Morning Herald…..still published) so my Dad could keep up with the news. The Ko-rean War was raging then, ’50-’53 and as I read all about it, I never imagined I’d end up there myself. Thankfully the shooting part of the war was over by then. We had the morning paper delivered to Tasty Lunch. In a “small world” story I was dis-cussing my boyhood memories with an old buddy who lives in Tampa near The Vil-lages, Tom Carney, who was a school chum. Tom told me he had been the delivery boy of that morning paper ……something I didn’t know until a couple of years ago.
Yet another “small world” story happened a few years ago when I met a guy here in The Villages for the first time and we discovered we were both from Uniontown. He is Andy Brain……his family owned the building Tasty Lunch was in and he was a stock boy for the Streamline next door. He’s a little older than I am but his sister, Nancy, was in my class.
TYPICAL TASTY LUNCH MENU
(as best as I can remember)
Hot Dogs 10c Hamburgers 15c Cheeseburgers 20c Grilled Cheese 20c
Pies 20c/slice (alamode) 25c-apple,cherry, coconut cream, Boston cream, pumpkin
Donuts /Pasteries (Danish like) 10c
Ice Cream 5c/scoop in cone or dish- vanilla, chocolate-sometimes-strawberry maple walnut
Candy Bars 5c Clark-Hersheys plain or with almonds -Milky Way-Baby Ruth
Ham and eggs 30c Pancakes/syrup 25c (available until 11 AM)
Varied 50c Fish Fry (Fri only) Veal Cutlet, Meat Loaf, Spaghetti/meatballs, Liver & Onions, Baked Ham
COLLEGE DAYS 1953-1957
I was 17 when I started college and graduated when I was 21. I went to Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, now called Carnegie Mellon University. I was a good student, mainly Bs. It was very hard and there were many brainy students at-tending. My favorite subjects were calculus, inorganic and organic chemistry, chemistry lab, chemical engineering unit operations and business management.
I lived in a dorm, Welch Hall (remember the story about my grandfather?), off cam-pus in an apartment “The Hut”) and in the fraternity house. That was Delta Tau Delta which I joined in my freshman year. I made many friends and had a really good time there. I was in intramural sports; football, volleyball, tennis, bowling, etc. We had super parties with music and had a pool table and table tennis table as well as table shuffleboard. We had the best “buggy”, a soapbox derby like car which we had to push up hills in races. I sang in an event which was called “Greek Sing”. I was, at best, an average singer but I was loud! My best friends were: Ken Laughery, Wayne Dickinson, Lou Salvador, John Burchard, Hugh Coble, John Sweeney, Bill Wilton, John Ekiss, Al Koch, Tony Robbi, Dave Bushmire, and Harry Dukakis. I’m glad and proud to say that I am still in touch with most of them to this day.
I was in charge of the kitchen and dining room at the fraternity house….title Stew-ard. I planned the meals, ordered the food and scheduled brothers to clean etc. Guess my training from Tasty Lunch and my Father came in handy. Of course I had two excellent helpers in Mabel, the cook and Mildred, the housekeeper. This job also paid me money which was applied to my fraternity dues.
In the summers I worked in a Steel Mill called The Edgar Thompson Works in Brad-dock PA, Andrew Carnegie’s first Mill. It was hard, dirty and dangerous work but I made enough money to help pay for some of my college expenses. I took street-cars to and from work and the frat house where I stayed. I loved the night shift, 12midnight to 8 AM, because it was cooler then. My main job was “metalergical ob-server” with responsibilities to record and measure all aspects of the steel making process. The most difficult part was to place a thermocouple which was a 12 foot long heavy tube into the 200 ton oven of molten steel (2500 degrees). This was to be sure the steel was ready to be poured into large ingots which were waiting nearby. There were 5 doors in the furnace and the foreman selected one of them for me to take the temperature. Once, he changed his mind after telling me to go into door # 2 and said I should use door #4. As I took the temp through door #4 which took about 5 minutes (I was dressed in protective clothes and had goggles on since it was well over 130 degrees) about 10 tons of molten steel erupted out of door #2 where I might have been standing. Of course if that had happened, I wouldn’t be telling you this and you wouldn’t even exist!!
Although I dated many girls for 3½ years and was even “in touch” with my high school girlfriend, Patty, I didn’t have any serious girlfriends. The best thing that hap-
pened to me while I was in college was finding Nana. Kathleen Ann Duffy was the prettiest, smartest, and most fun girl I had ever seen or met. I was amazed that she was even interested in me since she was so beautiful and popular. Actually, I had to wait 6 weeks for my first date with her. She was a sophomore English major and I helped her with chemistry and she helped me with my reports. We fell in love and are still together after all these years. Aren’t you glad?
In the Spring of 1957 we spent as much time together as we could. We went “steady” and then got “pinned”. That was a big deal in frat life and my brothers threw me into a pond when they learned of our pinning. That was our tradition. Of course, you know the rest and you’re a big part of it.
I hope all of you will be as lucky as I was to find a lifelong soulmate.
MILITARY
While in college I was in ROTC, which stands for Reserve Officers’ Training Program. I signed up for the Signal Corps (because the line for the Engineers’ Corps was too long). We learned about military history, weapons, communications etc. Once a week we wore uniforms and marched on “The Cut” on campus and passed in review as we paraded by our ROTC instructors.
Between my junior and senior year in 1956, I attended Army Summer Camp at Ft. Gordon in Augusta GA. I flew there from Pittsburgh in my first plane ride ever. (I didn’t know then that many more would follow!) Camp was hard and hot with lots of bugs and snakes. Most days we trained for 12 hours and we had very little time off. I got to meet all kinds of guys with different backgrounds from all over the country, and made some good friends. I was glad when it was over and I could re-turn to my Steel Mill job, which seemed easy in comparison to Camp.
I was selected to be a Lt. Colonel in ROTC, so when we got back for our senior year, I was commander of the Signal Corps battalion. That was a big deal, especially when we paraded and I could shout orders to hundreds of my classmates. I also became an officer in the Honorary Society, “Scabbard and Blade’. After I got to know Nana, she attended all the parades and watched her guy (me) proudly.
Upon graduation, I was commissioned an officer, a 2nd Lt. I went to Ft. Monmouth in New Jersey for more training. After the basic course I was selected to attend special classes to become a radio communications officer. That was in the fall of 1957.
Then in early 1958, I received orders to go to Korea. This was an unfortunate turn of events for me, because I had been slated to go to Greece to be the Communica-tions Officer for the US Embassy in Athens, since I spoke Greek. Unfortunately, I was tops in my radio course (good news/bad news) and that’s who they wanted for the special assignment in Korea. So it goes!
So from Feb. 1958 until April 1959, I was in Korea in the 8th US Army. It was a long flight over from Pittsburgh to Chicago to San Francisco to Hawaii to Wake Island, to Japan, to Seoul. Finally, there was a train ride through the war torn countryside of Korea to Chunchon, which is in the center of the Korean peninsula near the 38 th par-allel, where much of the fighting during the 1950 to 1953 war took place. An inter-esting note is that it was winter in both the US and Korea so we naturally wore our winter uniforms. When we got to Hawaii our plane had a problem and had to be re-paired before we could proceed safely, so we got some “free time”. I bought an “aloha shirt” and went to the beach. It wasn’t until many years later that I got to re-ally enjoy Hawaii, even though I first experienced it in Feb. 1958.
The unit I was assigned to was the 4th US Army Missile Command, specifically the 226th Signal Company as Radio Officer. I was responsible for radio sites around Chunchon in support of our rockets, which had atomic warheads. Other than the two A-bombs that were dropped on Japan to end WW II, these were the first A-weapons to leave the US.
Although the war had been over for 5 years (luckily for me), the country was still devastated and the conditions terrible……it was filthy without much clean water and because they used human waste for fertilization, it smelled awful all the time and there were rampant diseases. Amazingly you get used to the smell so when new people arrived and asked “what’s that awful smell ?” the “oldtimers” would answer “what smell?”. Chunchon, the 4th largest city in South Korea, with hundreds of thou-sand people had only one building more than one story high…..the police station.
We helped as much as we could but the needs were overwhelming. I was very in-volved with building and helping the orphanages, especially one which we adopted. We brought supplies and gave them money and helped in other ways by building things for them and bringing them to our Camp for meals. Still, it was very sad to witness these conditions and how destitute and unhappy they all were.
I also befriended some Irish priests (Christian Brothers) who were there doing mis-sionary work. They were great people and we helped them with supplies and money.
Our post, Camp Page, had better conditions than the area in general and although it wasn’t luxurious, we had clean water, good food, fairly comfortable quarters to live
and sleep in when we were not in the field and we made it better as time passed. Sgt. “Willie” Mays was my sgt. and ran the radio platoon very well. In addition to my communications duties, I was Mess Officer for our Company (I kept getting stuck with the food and kitchens until Nana took over after we got married). I liked this job and had a super team. Sgt Moore was in charge, and had a good crew including many Korean workers. Also, I was responsible for the Theater, another job I en-joyed. Sgt. Jones was the Non Com in charge . We had nightly movies when we were not in the field and saw every one made from 1957 and 1958 (some good some bad). It cost 25 cents to get in but I got in free.
Although I had many friends and was very busy, it was difficult, mainly because I missed my family, friends and mostly Nana. We worked hard and were in “the field” (like camping but not as nice) often. I had to fly to visit my troops and equipment located at various sites in the area regularly. I was flown, mostly in helicopters. Happily, I survived three crashes, one of them very serious. I wrote about it in “CRASH” and will include it for you to read if you already haven’t. (Aren’t you glad I survived? You should be since you wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t.) I kept in touch with some of the officers I served with: Capt. Howie Gelina, the Company Commander and Maj. Bill Burton, the Missile command Signal Officer. They have since died. I lost touch with my roomie in Korea and friend from Ft. Monmouth, Lt. John Encell. But wait, I reconnected with him just recently after 55 yrs of no contact. He lives in CA and we correspond via e-mail. Small world isn’t it?
Just after my 23rd birthday, I was transferred to another unit called The 1st Cavalry Division for my final few months. They needed help with their radio communica-tions so I was sent to do that. It was located in near Uijonbu and was north of Seoul. While there I was promoted to 1st Lt.
I passed the time while overseas by writing letters to Nana which I did most every day. Reading the ones she wrote (over and over) most every day was very enjoy-able. I had time to read tons of books. Also, I built a high quality HI FI set which played records and music radio broadcasts. I was coach of the Company football team and we won 1st place in the Missile Command. I played poker, black jack, and the slots and won much money. I earned enough to buy Nana (and family) presents and household things for our future houses some which we still have.
My Korean experience helped shape my life and matured me. I had lots of responsi-bilities for a 22-23 whippersnapper and met many wonderful people from various parts of the country. And I DID get to see much of the world thousands of miles away from home. The South Korean people rebounded from the war and built a 1st rate democracy and modern country. They supply us with cars, electronics and golfers, (mainly female), among other things. I knew they would succeed since I saw that they were industrious, intelligent and had good family and moral values. I’m proud to have helped them in my small way. We still have many troops sta-tioned there although I don’t fully understand why.
When it was time to come home in April of 1959…..I had been ready for some time. It was a happy time! I flew to Japan, Hawaii, San Francisco, Chicago then Pitts-burgh. The Army has exactly the same meals most everywhere so I had two identi-cal Easter meals , one in Japan and the other in San Francisco. Know why? Well, I crossed the International Date Line, which is between Hawaii and Japan, and gained the day I had lost on the way over. Coming home had to be one of the happiest days of my life. Seeing my family and of course, Nana who was more beautiful than I remembered her.
I took some time off then headed to Ft. Monmouth where I was assigned to the Offi-cers’ Department to teach others all about the things I had learned while in Korea. I liked that since it was near Nana’s home and since we were planning our wedding once she graduated we got to spend lots of time together. This duty was the easi-est I had while in the Army. I learned to play golf, went to the beach and mostly spent time with Nana at her parents’ summer home in Highland Lakes, NJ.
My final Army experience took place in 1961-62 when I was recalled with the 411th Signal Company in which I was a reserve Radio Officer. And, as you might have guessed, I was once again assigned to be the Mess Officer. The food/kitchen/dining room always stayed with me. It was a recall for the Berlin Crisis and we went to Ft. Monmouth for about 11 months. Although we thankfully didn’t go to war or even overseas (we had been slated to deploy to France) we had our lives disrupted and had to get ready in case we were called to battle.
The best part of the 411th call up was that we made lifelong friends including the Goldmans, the Donahers and Hesselberths and others.
As I reflect on my Military experiences, they were important growing periods for me. I got to travel to far off lands and meet many people from different parts of the country, many with different backgrounds from mine. I had significant responsibili-ties and feel that I contributed to this great country of ours which I love dearly. In some ways, I know that, I not only matured, but realize that these times helped shape me into the person I became.
PETS
I’ve already mentioned some of these so here’s a list of my pets over the years with pictures of most of them:
Sparky-first one, a mutt dog when I was 6-8 yrs old-no pic
Perky-another rescued/found mutt dog when I was 12-15-no pic
Assorted rabbits, chickens, even a lamb-when I was 5-12-no pics
Ouzo-a beautiful cat your Mothers found in about 1968 in our Pinecrest neighbor-hood-they tried (not too hard) to find its owner but couldn’t (or didn’t), so we adopted her. Unfortunately she died when she was hit by a car close to our house.
Mavros-a black and a little white cat we adopted from Lollipop Farm-we thought he was a she so we named her Daphne-when the Vet told us she was a he, he became Mavros (black in Greek). He brought us many birds and even a snake and was a su-perior hunter. He was with us for about 5-6 yrs before he wandered away one day and never returned.
TJ-another cutie we got from Lollipop Farm-got his name because they told us he was from Virginia so TJ was for Thomas Jefferson. Once he was “harpooned” with a tree limb when he jumped off a tree. The Vet said the limb, which was sticking all the way through his body, missed all his vital organs and he fully recovered. He was with us for 5-6 yrs and went to CO with us as your Mothers snuck him into the Motels which didn’t allow pets. Sadly, his good luck ran out when he drowned/froze in the pool cover of the neighborhood Parkwood pool which was filled with rain wa-ter and we speculated he had chased something into the cover and couldn’t get out.
Tigger was a handsome tiger cat that Jennifer bought at a pet store in Ft. Collins in a Mall where she worked. He flew home to Rochester with Daphne in the KODAK cor-porate jet and was with us for over 12 yrs at Hillhurst. He died in 1993 of heart fail-ure while the Vet tried to save him. Lots of pics!
Daphne was our dog and she came from ”Lollipop Farm West” in Ft. Collins. She was with us for over 18 yrs and lived in Ft. Collins, Hillhurst, and Bristol View Drive. A very special pet, she was a big part of the family for those many years. She was very loveable and everyone who met her loved her. Lots of pics!
CARS I HAVE OWNED
I told you about the 1936 Chevy that I sort of owned with my friend George Mauler when I was in High School. So that was my first car……sort of.
My Father bought a 1952 Pontiac for the family when I was a senior in High School. It was two tone blue and a real beauty. Aunt Betty and I both learned how to drive in it. We called it “The Silver Streak”.
My real first car was a 1956 Plymouth which I bought when I was a senior in college. I paid $1,200 for it and it was almost new but I got a deal on it because the dealer had driven it about 600 miles. I used all of my savings from money I earned working in the steel mill, being the steward for the Frat House and left over ROTC checks. It
was very plain and simple and grey in color. Nana and I called it “The Grey Ghost”. When I went to Korea, Aunt Betty used it until I returned in 1959.
After my first Army stint and our wedding, it was the best we could afford but the car was failing and needed much maintenance since it had over 100,000 miles on it. So we borrowed some money and bought a 1960 white Plymouth Valiant which was very sporty. Plymouth called it a GT, Italian for Grand Turisimo. This car lasted about 5 years and had many miles on it due to many trips to and from Uniontown, Westwood, and commuting to work for both Nana and me. It was also with us dur-ing my recall in 1961 and logged many round trips between Ft. Monmouth and Westwood/Highland Lakes so Nana and I could be together as much as possible.
In 1965, about the time Jennifer came into our lives, we bought a red very sporty Dodge Dart hardtop convert. This was one of my favorite cars ever. We had lots of fun driving it.
When Carol arrived in 1966, we needed a family car as well as a second car so we bought a white 1966 Dodge station wagon. Unfortunately, so much salt was used on the roads in Rochester to remove snow and ice, the white car was soon covered with rust. So in a few years I wised up and traded in on a rust colored Dodge station wagon. That somewhat solved the problem since the rust was less noticeable.
By 1970 the red sporty Dodge Dart was tired so we got a green Dodge hardtop. It wasn’t as sporty as the red one, but got us around. In 1975 my friend, Charlie Weller, sold me his brown Mercury Capri, affectionately known, especially by Stephanie, who had arrived in 1968, “the PACRI”.
Then in 1979, my tennis buddy, Jon Heinrich, sold us a Chevy Malibu, known forever as “Malibu Sue”. She took us to CO and was a great car for many years and miles. Jennifer saw it to its end.
There were two Pontiac Sunbirds, a 1983 and a 1988. Both were good transporta-tion but unremarkable cars.
We replaced the Capri with a Datsun (what Nissans were called back then) and yet another sporty one, a red Datsun Pulsar. That was a top notch car and served us well for years including Carol in Boston and Stephanie in CO.
It was replaced with a 1990 red GEO Storm, a really neat car. Jennifer took it over when we were through with it.
Since 1988, we’ve had mostly Acuras. Carol had done a study in her business school class at BC about how Honda was introducing their luxury line called Acura so we gave it a chance. First one was a 1988 gold Integra, followed by a 1990 grey Legend. Then a 1993 gold TL and in 1996 came a green TL with the first navigator some of you will remember as “Georgette”. In 2003 there was a gold TL which we
still own, and shortly after, a 2003 silver TL that Jennifer still drives (with over 200,000 miles on it).
Our current car is a blue 2006 TSX. It has taken us to and from FL and CO several times now.
I left my favorite and most expensive car until last, a red Mercedes Benz 1999 SLK 280 convertible known as the “James Bond” car. The top moved into the trunk to make it a convertible and we were off but we couldn’t take much with us since the trunk was filled with the car top and there was no back seat. It was not very practi-cal but loads of fun. Samantha was learning to drive so she got to zoom around the countryside in it when we visited Red Creek. Stephen and Matthew would both squeeze into the front seat (they were small then) and would always want to go ev-erywhere in the “James Bond” car.. Nana and I had many fun trips in it. When I went golfing with the top down, I had to put my clubs in the passenger seat. In time, my knees became “creeky and acky” so it was a major effort to get in and out of this gem of a car. That’s when I gave it up. It was a memorable car for 4 years.
WHERE I LIVED
I told you about Martins Ferry, 51R and 267 Lincoln St. in Uniontown already.
And in college I lived in Welch Hall, The Delt House and The Hut in Pittsburgh as well as the barracks in Ft. Gordon GA during the summer of 1956.
After college, I lived at the YMCA and 58 Maplewood Drive in Rochester then the BOQ (Bachelors Officers Quarters) in Ft. Monmouth and in the BOQs in Korea both at the 4th Missile Command in Chunchon and at the 1st Cavalary Div in Uijonbu in Korea.
When Nana and I got married in 1959, our first apartment was in the Dohr Apts. on Rumson Rd. in Greece NY. It was new and fairly nice and we stayed there until I was recalled to the Army in 1961. Our most vivid memory of this place was the snow storms of “59-“60 when it snowed almost every day and totaled over 160 inches for the season. We were on the second floor and we rarely could see any-thing but snow out of our window. Nana almost went back to New Jersey (aren’t you glad she didn’t-I am!)
While in for The Berlin Crisis, I lived in yet another BOQ (it was called The Pink Palace because it was painted a pinkish color) at Ft. Monmouth and Nana stayed with her parents in Westwood.
We returned to another new apartment called Holyoke Apts. I could walk to work so Nana could use our only car to drive to her teaching job.
Our first house was 168 Pinecrest Dr. in Irondequoit, NY. All of your Mothers were born while we were there and we stayed from 1963-1974. There are many pictures and lots of happy memories. I used to look out of our front window and felt like I was in a Hollowood movie scene. We had a garden, wading pool, jungle gum and even a skating rink.
In 1974 we bought a bigger house, 140 Hillhurst Dr. just a few blocks away. All of your Mothers got to have their own room and we had a pool. It was a very wooded lot so we had beautiful trees and got to rake the leaves in the Fall. It was also near Lake Ontario beach and Durand Eastman Park. St. Thomas church and school were a walk away.
When we went to CO in 1980 we lived in a rented house on buttonwood Dr. in Park-wood. I’ve already told you about the pool and tennis courts and that that’s when we got Daphne and Tigger.
We sold Hillhurst in 1997 long after all of your Mothers were on their own and moved to Woodcliff in Perinton, NY, 37 Bristol View Drive. It was on the Woodcliff golf course and near the hotel AND, very important for Nana , Eastview Mall. We loved it there and stayed until 2006.
In 2006, we bought our first house in FL. at 1658 Snelling Dr. It was in the Village of Mallory Square and close to everything in The Villages. Our first, golf car arrived then too.
We leased a town house, 10 Hidden Harbour Way in Webster NY. This made it easy to go back and forth to FL. There was an amazing view of downtown Rochester and it was a great spot to watch fireworks.
from all of the towns. Also, we were able to take nice long and peaceful walks around the neighborhood.
Finally, I think, in 2009 we bought 2323Bramble Ter in the beautiful Village of Bonita. It’s on the Kenya Golf Course and we can see holes #2, #3, and #8. It’s in what is now the center of The Villages so its easy to get to everywhere we go here. Of course, a second golf car, Nana’s arrived and lets her go where she needs to go without scheduling with me.
I’ll try to include all the pictures of these places that I can find.
INSERT KODAK CHAPTER
COLORADO
In the late 70s Kodak built a new plant in Windsor, CO and I helped plan it. In 1980 our family went to live there and we stayed for about 1 ½ years (‘80-’81). We lived in a rented house on Buttonwood Drive in Parkwood in Ft. Collins. A pool and tennis courts were across the street and we had good neighbors like the Eckls and the Blankenships. To say that this assignment changed us in many ways, is an under-statement. All of your Mothers went to college and or went to live in CO as some of you do now.
We did many exciting things….like learn how to ski, fly hot air balloons, visit many of our National Parks, etc.
I did a lot of hiking and even climbed Long’s Peak in Rocky Mt. Park-14,255 ft to the top…..a high point of my life.
We went to Colorado Springs, Rocky Mt. Park, Denver, Vail, Aspen, Glenwood Springs, Steamboat, Yel-lowstone, Jackson Hole, The Sand Dunes, Mesa Verde, The Grand Canyon, Bryce Canyon, Zion Park and many more.
We bought a condo at Copper Mt. (Snowflake 308) and later one in West Vail (21 B Gore Creek Mead-ows) and skied lots of fun places in and around CO.
Daphne and Tigger were two of the best things that happened while we were there.
I LOVED COLORADO then and still do. Lots of pictures will complete the story.
ACTIVITIES
I’ve always loved sports…to both play and watch. As a young boy it was baseball and the Pittsburgh Pi-rates. I listened to the games and even kept box scores. Rosy Rosewell and Bob Prince were the an-nouncers and were real characters that I still remember fondly. As I was growing up, the Pirates were not very good and as luck would have it, only got successful after I left the Pittsburgh area in 1957.
I told you about the first game I got to see on my trip as a patrol boy to Washington DC. And I did have the Uniontown Coal Barons, a Class D team that was a Pirate farm club. We went to the games and chased fouled balls but always brought them back to the players.
Then in 1948 one of my Father’s friends took me to a Pirate game at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Little did I know then that I would go to college near the ballpark 5 years later and get to see many games. By the way, the Pirates beat the Cubs 4-2 that day. A memory…..I had never realized that foul balls hit into the stands could be kept by the fans…..unlike the where the Coal Barons played.
It cost about 60 cents to go to a game when I was in college, a real bargain. I took Nana to a night game that lasted 16 innings and wasn’t over until midnight. The Cards won 8-7 when Stan Musial, a Hall of Famer, one of the greatest players ever, and a local favorite because he was from nearby Donora PA, hit a towering home run. Nana wanted to leave after 9 innings and was worried about the curfew that re-quired her to be back to her dorm, but she reluctantly stayed with me because she loves me.
In 1960 the Pirates met and beat the Yankees in a famous World Series in 7 games when Bill Mazeroski hit a homerun in the bottom of the ninth of the seventh game to end it…..never been done by anyone else or since then either. I was unable to get tickets to the 4 games in Pgh but, thanks to Nana’s Dad, your great grandfather, I got to see the 3 in NY at Yankee Stadium. For the next 30 yrs, the Pirates were good but then had a 20 yr. dry spell. Now they’re back……I think.
I followed the Rochester Red Wings and went to some games and even took some of you. We always spent much more on food than tickets. Stephen and Matthew will probably remember the game where Matt got a ball and we left because the Wings were down by 3 runs and doing awful. We heard loud cheers as we got to the car and only found out when we got home that they hit a grand slam home run to win it in the bottom of the ninth. So remember, it’s never over ‘til it’s over.
Although I’m fairly unhappy about the current state of baseball…drugs, greed, high prices for tickets, outrageous salaries, etc, I still consider myself a fan.
Football was another one of my sports and still is. The Uniontown Red Raiders, our high school team, was good and that’s where my interest got started. Aunt Betty was a cheerleader and I went to all the games which were on Friday nights. My junior year they were undefeated and won the PA State Cham-pionship. My college team was so-so but I went to most of their games. They were called the Carnegie Tech Tartans. I only played on the fraternity team and in the Army where I was coach of our champi-onship Company team.
The Steelers weren’t very good when I was in Pgh. But they excelled starting in 1972 and have been one of the best NFL teams of all time. They’ve won 6 Super Bowls (lost 2), the only team to do so. I’ve watched as many games as I can and follow them closely. I like the Denver Broncos because we saw a few of their games when we lived in CO and the Buffalo Bills who are close to Rochester and where we went to see games, mostly when the Steelers were in town. Favorite memories include being there
with Carol when I got hypothermia in a -20 degree wind chill game one December. Watching the Steel-ers destroy the Bills on a 90 degree day made unforgettable since Stephen was there but wasn’t born yet. Poor Jenn suffering in the extreme heat while 8 months pregnant.
Basketball centered around my younger days when we built a basketball court in George Mauler’s back yard (remember the Goose owner?) and I played intramural but was quite short and not a very good player. One year we won while I was captain and I made the winning free throws. Bet you didn’t know we did them underhanded back then. Uniontown had good teams and I was a manager for them one year….handing out towels and drinks and looking after the balls. I did follow the Irondequoit Indians (now Eagles) while your Mothers went there.
Now I follow the Duke Blue Devils since I went to Business School there. They have a great program that produces very competitive teams and players year after year and they’ve won several National Championships. Coach K is a gem of a coach and person who’s won record numbers of games.
Golf is probably my favorite sport to both watch and play. I learned how to play when I was in the Army and play as often as I can. I’m OK but could always be better. It’s a very challenging game both mentally and physically. I’m delighted that Nana now plays and often joins me these days. She’s a good chipper and putter. I was at my best in the 70’s and 80’s and sported a single digit handicap. Since then I’m less serious, and less good, but really have more fun at the game.
I have two holes-in-one. The first shortly after I just started to play was at Latta Lea’s first hole (playing it the second time that day..it is a nine hole course)….115 yds with a pitching wedge. The second was in 1976 at Clifton Springs CC in a driving rain storm. We were quitting for the day and heading in but de-cided to hit one more shot and I hit a 4 wood 156 yards which we couldn’t see due to the heavy rain. No one could find it until one of my playing partners said: “did you look in the cup?”…..and there it was!! A real miracle!! Other memories include a birdie on Pebble Beach’s No 7 that sticks out in the Pacific Ocean and a remarkable 76 at Salmon Creek CC, my lowest score ever. And recently in 2011, I shot two eagles (2’s on a par 4) on the same hole in consecutive rounds the first two times I played the Ft. Walton 9 on the Bonifay Course in The Villages. In addition to Pebble Beach, I’ve managed to play some other famous courses: Oak Hill, Locust Hill, Pinehurst, The Breakers, Barton Creek, Harbour Town, Jekyll Is-land, Banf Springs, and a few others I can’t remember.
I watch on TV and enjoy it. Also, I’ve seen many famous golfers play in person when they’ve come to Rochester. Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Tiger Woods etc. plus many others. Nana and I worked at the LPGA Women’s events at Locust Hill for years. We cooked and served food and helped in the Finance Office for many years. The money that was raised went to needy children and was spon-sored by Rotary. Also we gave out programs at the Ryder Cup at Oak Hill. We went to most of the na-tional tournaments that have been held in Rochester like the US Opens, PGAs etc.
Our family was most active in Tennis over the years. I played singles, doubles and mixed doubles. I won a few tournaments over the years. Carol will remember how I blew a Father/Daughter match we were in when I lost 3 points after we had 3 set points to win the tournament. We lost after that. Oh well, so it goes. Not sure she’s ever forgiven me. Sorry. Nana used to tell how I would tell her to serve then get
out of the way when we were playing mixed doubles and we really needed the point. I was a very ag-gressive “net man”. As my knees got weary, I stopped playing. It’s a great game and I miss it.
I learned how to ski in 1980 when we lived in CO. I wasn’t very good, but I loved it. The beauty of the mountains and the outdoors, especially in CO, were always uplifting and breathtaking. We skiied most of the slopes in CO. I tried some of the Canadian Ski areas but I was older and it was always so cold there. Once when I was in the Lake Louise area I had a chance to ski Sun Rise? for the second time but opted out and went dog sledding instead at Canmore….now that was really fun. And I was able to re-port to Steph that they were quite good to the sled dogs who seemed to receive much enjoyment from the racing. Once again, as my knees got weary, I fell and hurt more so I stopped skiing. I miss it much.
I should also mention hot air ballooning. When we lived in CO, I became friends with Milt Silinzsky who owned a hot air balloon. I crewed for him and got to go on many flights usually at very early hours in the morning. Your Mothers got to fly too. We attended the Hot Air Balloon Festival in Albequerque , NM.in the first week of Oct. of 1980. There were over 400 balloons from all over the world in attendance. The Festival is still held there and has well over 1000 balloons that fly now.
You all must know that putting together picture puzzles (hard ones) is one of my favorite activities. As is Sudoko….more puzzles. And I love to read. I used to jog lots but now only walk as much as I can.
Over the years I was involved with some Charity work. I helped organize the National Career Explorer Boy Scout Program and was a Scout Leader for one of the Posts. This group helped high schoolers ex-plore careers in science and engineering. I was always preaching that it was just as important to dis-cover what you didn’t want to do with your life as it was to decide what you did. As the father of girls, I regretted that this was a “boy only” program so am glad that these days it is open to both boys and girls.
Nana and I were active in CAP which was the Council of Adoptive Parents when we helped found it. Of course, this resulted from the joy and blessing of being able to adopt Jennifer in 1965. I had been on the board of directors of Northhaven where we adopted Jennifer for several years so I knew the “adoption ropes”. The group kept its CAP name but changed its meaning to Children Awaiting Parents. Although it was a Rochester program at the beginning, it became a National program which still sponsors the CAP Book which is a nationwide book with pictures of children waiting and needing to be adopted.
The Old Newspaper Club raised money for people who were in need but unable to get help from other agencies. We raised money for them through the Rochester Newspapers Fund Drive.
In the early eighties, I became associated with the Park Ridge Hospital Board and did mainly fundraising for their Foundation. I was president of The Foundation for several years and saw this group grow into Unity Health System which became the primary health care provider for the western part of the Rochester area.
INSERT FAMILY
RETIREMENT
When I left KODAK in 1991, I was 54 and too young to fully retire. So that’s when I wrote TEAM ZEBRA and that led to a successful consulting career for about 10 years. During this time I travelled all over the country and to Canada and Great Britain and worked with many organizations of all types; large and small manufacturing, private and public , for profit and not for profit, local, state, and federal govern-ment, etc.
The message was simple to describe but hard to do. Most organizations need to improve as did the ones I worked with. And most of them have a common problem, utilizing their people better than they did. So my job was to coach and encourage them to better accomplish this through leadership, team-work, and empowerment. So for these 10 years, I tried to urge those I worked with to learn from the lessons of TZ and to inspire them that, if we did, they could do it too.
If you read TZ, and I hope you will, you’ll better understand, and I soon realized, that it doesn’t matter what products you are making, what services you are providing, where you are located, what size you are, your people hold the key to your success…..if you let them and encourage them.
So it was fun and rewarding. I enjoyed it. I visited lots of places and met lots of good people. And I think I made a difference to many of them and how they thought about and did their work.
During those 10 yrs. Nana and I travelled extensively. We spent time with all of your families whenever we could and she went with me to many of the workshops I conducted in some interesting places.
We bought places in Palm Desert CA and Hilton Head, SC and tried to get there most years at least once. PD was a Marriott Time Share near Palm Springs in CA. What fun…pools, tennis, golf, the Living Desert, good restaurants, bear claws, and golfers who hit “bad shots”. Of course you had to watch out for the mean red ants!! We had many good memories and lots of enjoyable stays there.
Harbourtown Yacht Club in Hilton Head was also a regular stop for us between 1992 & 2006. The Club was 1st Class and we loved the Yacht Basin and the Sea Pines Plantation setting. We walked the beach daily and had the most wonderful views. The Club’s boat, the Mystic, took us out on the Calibogue Sound to enjoy the water, the sunsets, and the frolicking dolphins. Once we watched these bottle nosed
dolphins which were always swimming with the boat, playing ball. Really…..they made balls out of the seaweed and would use their noses to pass the ball to each other. They seemed to know they were en-tertaining us. There were wonderful (expensive) restaurants with lots of delicious food.
Golf was difficult and also expensive since all the courses were well known championship courses. We would take a boat to Dafuskie Island which was about a half hour away to play Melrose, Bloody Point or Haig Points golf courses. Tough but fun golf! My friend Bernie Girouard and I won the Club Champi-onship one year and I hit the longest drive of the tournament….265 yards (it hadn’t rained for a while so my ball rolled and rolled and rolled some more!! By the way, there was much discussion what Dafuskie meant. It was a feather shaped island so some thought it meant “feather” in Native American. Others were just as sure that it was the way southerners said “da fust key” which it was.
In 2004 our friends Sally and Earl Thomas invited us to come see them in The Villages where they were staying. They claimed it was too hard to describe! Well, Nana and I never wanted to live in FL based on our impression of it from the days when your Mothers’ grandparents lived there but we agreed to drive down to visit to be nice. Of course, you know what happened….we fell in love with it.
It had many things Hilton Head didn’t have; like lots of “doable” golf, very easy to make friends, rela-tively inexpensive living, load of restaurants, tons of activities, and much better weather.
We rented for a month in 2005 and returned for 2 months in 2006. Then we decided to buy….a small house on 1658 Snelling Dr. in Mallory Square……right where a tornado hit! We were lucky, not much damage and it worked out OK after they fixed everything like it was before the storm. After 2 years of being “snowbirds”, 4 months in FL during the winter, we decided to become, “seasonals”, half the year in FL. Don’t be alarmed, but the next phase is “frogs, in FL until we croak”!
We built our home at 2323 Bramble Ter. in 2009 then sold our Perinton home, leased the Webster town house and became FL residents saving tons of taxes.
As you know, we love it in The Villages. We have many friends….some from my Uniontown high school days like, Anne, Bill, Jacque, Jan, Ron, Nels, Corky, Henreitta, Tom, Polly, Bob, Lou and more who visit us here. Also we see friends from NY…Sally, Earl, Neil, Cindy, Dan, Sue, Chip, Dianne, Lindsay, June, Joyce and Steve B…..to name a few. And there are the new friends from other places….Sue & Roger (Jamestown), Alex & Mary (Binghamton), Ed & Sherri (Watertown), Jack & Dorene (Pittsburgh), Rick & Sue (Michigan), Tom & Vonnie (Florida and PA), Keith & Becky (VA and Boulder), Jan & Bob (Michigan), Art & Carolyn (NC and LA), John & Mary (Kentucky), Rafi & Aida (Puerto Rico) to name some. All are very nice and we have a good time with them!!
We walk almost every day as much as we can. Our main activities are golf and socializing with our friends. We belong to golf groups in our Bonita neighborhood, Earl and Sally’s Sunset Pointe neighbor-hood and Largo neighborhood friends.
We belong to several Clubs…Central New York, Irish (Celtic pronounced “KLETIC”), Kodak, Fayette County, and I recently joined The Science and Technology Club. It has some of the most amazing people
here and we give presentations to each other on subjects such as: space, photography, medicine, en-ergy, military technology, search for aliens from outer space (I kid you NOT), etc. I’m giving one on space and spy photography in Feb.
The activities never stop here and we are constantly busy and active. Never a dull moment!!
Although this happened 54 years ago, Mom/Nana thought I should write about it because you might find it interesting. True, even she hasn’t known fully about this incident until recently, had the outcome been just a little different you wouldn’t be here…..in fact you would never have been born.
The event happened on the 16th of September 1958. To me, it seems like yester-day in many ways. I was overseas in Korea as an Army Officer serving with the 4th US Army Missile Command. My principal duties were as Radio Signal Officer in the 226th Signal Company. I had been in Korea about 7 months on a 15 month assignment. So this occurred close to half way through my tour of duty.
I was in charge of radio communications for the Missile Command. Our mission was to supply the first installation of atomic weapons capability for the UN/US forces defending South Korea from attack from the North Koreans and the Chi-
nese. These were the first atomic weapons of ours then located outside the US and the first US ones ever overseas since two bombs had been dropped on Hi-roshima and Nagasaki bringing the end to WW II.
I had the “Additional Duty” of being Theater Officer for the 2,800 troops sta-tioned at Camp Page, Chunchon, Korea. This was an important job and I liked it. In August I had arranged to have our movies (the principal form of entertain-ment for all of us) converted from 16mm film to 35mm film. This would im-prove the quality and selection of movies we could show and, more impor-tantly, result in improved morale, something which was badly needed.
So in the afternoon of the day before the 16th, Captain Bob White and I flew to Seoul Korea to pick up the three projectors needed to make this conversion. We flew in a Beaver L-20 #837 light aircraft made to carry 5 passengers. In the time I had been there, I flew frequently, in either light planes like this one or he-licopters, to fulfill my duties since my troops and radio sites were all over the place. So this was nothing new for me. Bob was a friend and we had been there together since March. He was from the south, older, married and had children. I liked him a lot. The flight took about an hour.
We landed at Kimpo K-14 Air Base near Seoul and after parking the plane for the night went to dinner at the 8th Army Officers’ Club….a real treat. We slept at the 8th Army BOQ (Bachelor Officers’ Quarters) which was a palace compared to our very humble quarters in Chunchon.
In the morning, after breakfast, we headed to the Airfield. Capt. White super-vised the loading of the projectors onto the plane….they were large, heavy and bulky. After I signed the papers provided by the 8th Army Theater Officer we were set to go. It was about 10 AM and the weather was just perfect. It was a bright day with no clouds and little wind.
As soon as we took off, Bob mentioned “the plane didn’t feel right”. He was ab-solutely correct that something was wrong and after 3-5 minutes of flight we stopped gaining altitude. He tried several things including having me use my co-pilot controls…….I used to fly often and in fact had flown part of the way the previous day from Chunchon…..no luck, there was nothing wrong with the con-trols.
Bob radioed the Kimpo tower “May Day-May Day I’m going to make an EL (emergency landing) immediately”. All airfields had these emergency strips and Kimpo’s was on the bank of the Han River about five miles from the airport. Had we been higher, we had only gained 800 feet, we could have returned to the airfield. Not possible in these circumstances.
I had flown many emergency landing drills in various planes and places, mainly around Chunchon. And although my heart was pounding a mile a minute, I had confidence that this would be OK. Bob was an expert and experienced pilot and the Canadian built L-20 Beaver was a reliable aircraft with a good record.
We came down the 800 ft. quickly and found the river bank emergency landing strip. It was hard packed sand and fairly smooth so the initial part of the land-ing was not too different from some other non-paved landing strips. We “hit the beach” at about 120 mph and slowed to about 100 mph. A Beaver has two wheels under the wings which are forward on the plane and one under the tail in the back. Everything was going well until the front two wheels hit a water runoff ditch about 1-2 feet deep.
Then, suddenly and loudly, the plane flipped as it crashed with loud noises and plane parts flying all over the place. CRASH! BOOM! CRASH! BOOM! A wing broke off as did part of the tail, and much of the 100 gals of aviation fuel we had taken off with was everywhere as it leaked out of the tanks onto the ground.
Then there was absolutely QUIET! I was dazed and disoriented, since I was hanging upside down in my safety harness. (I may have blacked out.) Here is what I recall my thoughts were during the minute or so of the crash. How much of this happened then, or was in my dreams and thoughts about the crash that I had for a long time after, I don’t know.
I thought about the two loves of my life, my Mother and Mom/Nana. How aw-ful for my Mom if I died, she would be devastated. And your Mom/Nana and I had been living on dreams through the letters we wrote daily to each other about our future life together while we were 12,000 miles apart. How terrible for her if we never got a chance to make those dreams come true. Then I saw the “Stars and Stripes”, the Army newspaper with the headlines: “Missile Com-mand officers Capt. Robert L White and Lt. Stephen J. Frangos were killed when their plane crash landed on the banks of the Han River Sept. 16, 1958”.
And I watched my casket with the flag draped over it go by with Taps playing. Only my Mom and your Mom/Nana were at the funeral dressed in black and crying their eyes out. I recalled how much my Mom cried when she had learned about the death of her sister during WW II. It was 1945 and I was nine….she cried for days as I (and others) told her it would be OK….she still couldn’t stop.
And your Mom/Nana was there dressed in black and looking her usual glam-orous self…..so beautiful……crying uncontrollably. When we parted at the Pitts-burgh Airport 7 months earlier she cried as we said our goodbys and she begged
me to come back to her safely. I remembered how I wouldn’t wash my face for days where her tears landed during our farewell tears.
Still in a daze, I wondered: “where was the light and the tunnel”?? I had read that that’s what happened when you died….I felt very cheated. Who knows how much of this went through my brain in the flash of the crash or if it devel-oped later. We’ll never know.
And of course, you know I didn’t die, or you wouldn’t be here and I wouldn’t be writing this to you.
I was brought back to “life” as Bob elbowed me and asked if I was OK. I replied “I thought so” and asked how he was? We were hanging upside down in our harnesses. The wrecked plane was all around us and he said we had to get out of it right away before it blew up. He was turning all the power switches he could reach to help prevent an explosion. As I released my harness, my head hit the top of the plane which was now on the ground. With the force of all my 165 pounds my head was smashed. I had also cut my leg which was bleeding ….and now I had a huge lump on my noggin.
The doors had become jammed during the crash but I was able to kick out my
window and crawl out. Although Bob managed to get out of his harness without hitting his head (he told me later that he had received train-ing on how to do this during flight school) his leg was injured so he couldn’t kick his window out. I stumbled around the wrecked plane (unable to comprehend what I was seeing) to his door and managed to somehow pull it open and then helped him out.
We started to scramble away from the plane before it caught fire and Bob yelled for me to grab the chutes. We were supposed to fly with them on but seldom did….a NONO punishable by Court Martial. Later I wondered how stupid wasting valuable time to get the chutes would have seemed if the blast had blown us up….but then who would have known. We’d be millions of little bits and so would the chutes.
As we stumbled/crawled away with our parachutes from the demol-ished plane, we heard the sounds of the rescue helicopter approach-ing. Now that’s service! And thankfully NO fire!!
It was very quiet now except for the approaching chopper, and the noise from mamasans, cleaning their clothes by beating them with wooden paddles, and the kids playing on the river bank. Curiously, they had all apparently stopped to watch the approach of the plane and come to a smashing stop, then went back to their own lives. I re-member thinking that life goes on as it would have if the result of our accident had been more tragic.
The rescue pilot made sure we were fairly OK then ordered us into his chopper to fly immediately. He said “don’t think just do it”. It seems many NEVER fly again after experiencing a crash and he wanted to make sure we weren’t among those who didn’t.
By the time we got back to Kimpo…10 min or so…the full Disaster Medical Team was there. We got sedatives and IV fluids. We were shaken, dizzy, and disoriented but glad to be alive. They cut off my pant leg….I was angry because it was my favorite pair of fatigues…to get to my leg wound and stop the bleeding. Bob got a splint for his leg and they took X-Rays to see if anything was broken. My head hurt but the Doc thought it was a concussion and if I was lucky there wouldn’t be any serious brain damage. I told him I WAS lucky. Then we rested.
Lt. Larry Gallagher was flying a plane from Chunchon to take us back to Camp Page. Sgt. Jones, my Theater Sgt, was coming with a truck to retrieve the projectors. Amazingly they were undamaged and worked perfectly. I was told that I couldn’t go back in the truck….I HAD to fly!
The accident investigation team was on the scene and we answered dozens of questions. They took lots of pictures, made measurements etc. Initial assessment was that the 3 projectors, although less than the weight of 3 people which the plane was built for, probably caused the plane to destabilize.
The final report, issued weeks later, found no mechanical failures, no pilot error, no weather problems, no incorrect procedures, and no maintenance breakdowns. Cause of accident….INCONCLUSIVE.
Beaver #837 went to the airplane graveyard.
Fortunately, Bob and Steve lived to tell the story.
In my final 7-8 months in Korea, I continued to fly as I performed my duties. I was involved in two more accidents, helicopter crashes. Nei-ther was as serious as the one I just wrote about. Your Mom/Nana used to say I was the safest person to fly with since I had already had my share of crashes, and more.
I returned to the States in April of 1959 and Mom/Nana was there waiting for me looking as beautiful as I had remembered her…even more so. She was 21 yrs old and I was 23. We were married in August when I left the Army and in the 53 years since have fulfilled the many dreams we had written about to each other during those many lonely months we experienced while I was away.
You might also like to know that there were about 7-8 Beaver crashes while I was in Korea. About 3-4 of these flipped while making emer-gency landings. Bob and I were the only ones who survived the flipped wreckages. I credit luck and my guardian angel.
And who knows, God may have some grand plans for you.
