October 10th

Today my dad would have celebrated his 96th birthday. He was a cool guy. His sense of humor and his quick wit is legendary in our family. He grew up in Illinois, graduated from Peoria High School, joined the CCCs, served in the U.S.Army in the Pacific in World War II. He was a member of Full Gospel Businessmen Fellowship International which we always called FiGaMiFy, and really a member of the Greatest Generation. My only regret is that he died too soon and my kids didn't get to know him.
     
He always could come up with names for things that were close enough that my brothers and I and a lot of time my mom too, thought he was right. I still identify them as black-bodied red birds instead of red-winged black birds. We just knew that he was pulling our legs though when he identified a pileated woodpecker. We didn't believe him for a long time on that one.
                                                

We went camping a lot when I was a kid. He taught me how to make a box trap so I could catch a chipmunk but was conspicuously absent when I finally caught one. He loved to go to the Metolius River, Allen Springs I think it was, so he could fish. Hunting was a big deal too. It was always deer hunting and I can remember studying my French in the car waiting for him while he was hunting up the Molalla River. Later on it was big camps in the Ochocos. Here's a picture from one of those camps.

He was a great dad.