Of Fathers and Sons – a Fathers Day Tribute to my Dad

I am now 17 years older than my father lived to be.

Imagine that.

Seventeen years.

I’ll never forget the night he died. I was working at Lechmere Sales at the Liberty Tree Mall in Danvers, MA. My wife Sandy suddenly appeared at the credit desk where I was a Supervisor. She whispered for me to follow her. I looked over at my boss to see if it was all right to leave. “It’s okay. Just go,” he said, as if knowing something I didn’t.

So I went.

Just outside the door I saw the parked car of our friends Skip and Deb.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“I have some very sad news, honey,” Sandy tearfully said. “Your dad,” she sobbed, “died tonight.”

She threw her arms around me.

I just stiffly stood there in utter disbelief.

“WHAT?” I blurted, still not able to process what Sandy said.

Through a flood of tears she told me my parents had been at a Faith at Work Conference in Connecticut. My dad suffered a massive heart attack. Even with a doctor present there was nothing they could do.

My dad was dead.

Skip and Deb drove us back to our apartment. At the door, Skip, my seminary classmate, said nothing. He just wrapped me up in a big hug. And wept with me.

Throwing some clothes together in a suitcase, Sandy and I jumped into our car, speeding off on the 90-minute drive to Worcester where my mom had already arrived at our family home. We rode mostly in silence, minds racing, trying to make some sense of it all, still not able to fully fathom what we knew to be true but just could not believe.

My father was gone.

It was November 2 , 1973.

He was just 50 years old.

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Half a century earlier, on July 8, 1923, my father started life in Greenfield, MA. Dad was a “Junior” – Martin Conrad Singley, Jr. – the firstborn of Martin Conrad Singley, Sr. and Hattie Della (Bryant) Singley. Growing up, family members called him “Junior,” or “Juny.” When I was born, mom and dad made me a “3rd” – Martin Conrad Singley, III. Thank goodness no one ever called me “The Third” – or some shortened variation.

I did not know my father’s father very well. All I really know about Grandpa Singley is that he had a hard life. His dad, Conrad Single, emigrated to the States from Germany. Conrad was of an upper echelon city family. He fell in love with a young German beauty named Henricka. But alas, Henricka was a country girl, below his class. His family would not allow Conrad to marry Henricka. So he gave up everything to move to America where he and Henricka could be together. They married and had four boys, one of whom was my grandfather.

Conrad, however, could not shake the life of privilege he’d lived in the old country. He is said to have strutted about town with an ornate cane, wearing a top hat and white gloves. And he was a lady’s man. When Henricka – pregnant with their fourth child – discovered Conrad’s affair with a local woman all hell broke loose.

So Conrad Single, my great-grandfather, put a gun to his head and killed himself.

His son, my grandfather – Martin Conrad Singley, Sr. – was the one who found his father’s body.

Like I said, my Grandpa Singley had a hard life.

Sometime later, Henricka remarried. His name was Henry. He turned out to be a wife beater. One day, Martin came upon Henry abusing Henricka. Martin rushed in to protect his mother, shoving his stepfather away. Henricka – afraid for her son’s life – urged Martin to run – to go and not come back. He mistakenly took that to mean his mother did not want him anymore.

And so Martin left, never to return home again. It is said that he went to the banks of the Deerfield River, shed his ratty old clothes, and threw them into the river as if shedding his past. But you can never really completely run away from all the demons of yesterday’s pain.

I don’t know much about my grandfather’s life after that except that he eventually met and married my grandmother Hattie. He worked for the railroad, was frequently away from home, gambled a lot, and drank too much. The marriage eventually crumbled and Hattie left Martin. But when he became ill with cancer she came home to care for him in his final days. Hattie Singley was a good, loving person. And despite the challenging ups and downs of their marriage, the legacy of Martin and Hattie Singley is that they gave life to three fine boys – Martin, Jr., Richard, and Don.

Martin Jr. – my Dad – was the oldest of the Singley boys. He was a wonderful baseball player. With a blazing fastball, he was a pitcher who evoked great protest from opposing teams. “Oh no! Not Singley!” they’d grouse when he went out to warm up. It seems Dad didn’t mind intimidating the other team’s batters by throwing an occasional blazing fastball at their heads. He was an aggressive player who studied the fundamentals of the game. Teaching his brother Don to field ground balls on a rock-strewn field, Don once took a bad hop in the face, breaking his nose. Despite the blood gushing out my father lectured his brother about the importance of “keeping your head down” and “playing the ball, not letting the ball play you!” These were lessons Dad later passed on to my brother and me – minus the broken nose.

Unfortunately, as sports-minded as Dad was during his youth, he had to give it all up to help support his mother and brothers. He was extremely devoted to them, working in a shoe store during his high school years to bring home a little extra cash.

During his high school years, Dad met a beautiful girl with strawberry blonde hair. Her name was Shirley Johnson. They fell in love.

But, like so many other young lovers of their generation, World War II interrupted the lives of Martin and Shirley.

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Dad never talked much about the war. He served in the South Pacific – most notably on Guam, the Marianas and Okinawa. He was a Signal Corps radio repairman attached to the Army Air Corps. The only story I remember him telling was of one terrifying night on Okinawa. He was on guard duty and heard a noise – something moving stealthily through the underbrush. Dad stiffened and raised his rifle. At the time, some Japanese soldiers were cornered on one end of the island. At night they tried infiltrating the American lines, attempting to make it back to the other part of the island where their forces were still in control. The noise my Dad heard in the darkness scared him. He challenged it.

“Who goes there?”

No response.

Two more times he asked.

“Who goes there?”

Still nothing.

Silence.

And then the noise returned.

So Dad aimed his carbine in the direction of the noise and pulled the trigger, emptying the whole clip of 8 shots.

There was a thump, and dead silence.

His whole unit was awake now, scrambling to take up defensive positions.

The decision was made to wait until dawn to see what was out there.

When the sun came up, they found out.

It was a goat.

As children we loved to hear Dad tell his goat story and he told it with great flair, dramatically pausing for several seconds before the big funny reveal at the end. Well, funny to us, but not the goat.

I don’t recall any other stories Dad told about the war, but I have seen photos of him standing by a burned out Japanese tank and posing next to a shot down Japanese bomber. My Uncle Don – Dad’s youngest brother – years later shared with me some letters and poems Dad wrote from the battlefield. They mostly relate his feelings about the very real possibility of being killed. They are so sad, and yet so real as testimony to what these young soldiers faced. The letters also contained little bits of wisdom and that my father hoped would help his young brother in life if he didn’t come home. One particularly poignant letter included instructions to his mother about what she would need to do to get the death benefit from his military insurance policy. In most of his writings there seemed to be a certain inevitability that he would be killed.

But, thankfully, Dad survived the war, safely returning to Greenfield, MA. Many of his high school classmates never made it home. When I was a boy I remember going with him to a Memorial Day service at Hope Cemetery in Worcester, MA. As the firing squad fired their 21 gun salute and the bugler played Taps, I saw tears spill from his eyes and trickle down his cheek. I remember to this day the faraway look on his face, as if seeing again the faces of lost friends and perhaps some of the 50,000 fellow soldiers who died fighting alongside him on Okinawa.

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Dad returned home to Greenfield to the waiting arms of his family and, of course, that pretty strawberry blonde-haired  girl, Shirley Johnson. Their love had deepened during the war, expressed in beautiful love letters and even some romantic “pin-up” type photos that Shirley sent. Nothing too cheesy, but I’m sure they provided incentive for Dad to keep his head down and come home safely. They were married on June 1st, 1946 in a backyard ceremony at the Johnson home on Beacon St. in Greenfield. Afterwards, they boarded a train and journeyed to Boston for a honeymoon that included going to a Boston Braves game. I think I told you, my dad loved sports, especially baseball!

After their marriage Dad and Mom moved to the Boston area where he worked as a bookkeeper and went to night school pursuing a degree in accounting. They were living in Stoughton, MA when my sister Karen was born in 1947. I came along in 1949. Subsequently, Dad went to work for Harrington & Richardson in Worcester, MA. That’s where our brother Steve came bouncing into the world. Dad and Mom bought a cute little Cape Cod style house on Calumet Ave, part of a sprawling subdivision of similar homes built to meet the needs of returning GI’s. All the men in the neighborhood had fought in the war and as we children grew we played “war” with toy guns and plastic army helmets. Once we actually shot down a plane, a jet fighter. A flight of three Air National Guard aircraft were flying overhead. We kids aimed our toy guns and opened fire. One of the planes exploded and spiraled to the earth, crashing into Forest St. near Indian Lake a few miles away. It was a mechanical problem, of course, but we didn’t know that. We thought we had shot it down. We worried about what we would tell Dad when he got home from work.

Actually, Dad’s return from work each afternoon was a very happy time because no matter what problems he’d faced at work that day he always found time to play with us kids. Our backyard at 35 Calumet Ave. had base paths worn into the grass from our whiffle ball games. As we got older we moved to the street outside our house and whiffle balls gave way to regular baseballs. That’s where Dad taught me the art of fielding hard hit ground balls and all those fundamentals he had earlier taught his brother Don. And he taught me about pitching too, including how to use a “brush back” pitch to move a batter off the plate. The first time I threw a curve ball it missed my Dad entirely and crashed through the front windshield of his car. Expecting the worst I braced for punishment but what I got was congratulations. The ball had actually curved and Dad patted me on the back and told me, “Great job!” Windshields can be repaired but not everyone can throw a curveball!

Dad was a hardworking man, rising to the position of Comptroller at the nation’s third largest printing company. But his work was not his life. His family was his life. He loved our mother. And he gave himself in unique ways to each of his children. Our family life revolved around sports – baseball, softball, and wonderful Friday nights bowling together at the King Philip Lanes in the Greendale neighborhood of Worcester. Afterwards we would stop at Slattery’s Spa on Burncoat St. and Dad would let us pick out a quart bottle of Polar soda (usually grape or orange) and a bag of State Line Potato Chips. Once home we’d sit in the living room, enjoying our snacks, watching The Flintstones on ABC, and laughing uncontrollably as Dad made up a silly tune and used his fingers as “The Scorpion” to tickle us. Dad was a playful man and we were his playmates. And we were his cast, too, for homemade 8mm movies that he conceived and directed. Our best was Little Red Riding Hood in which mom played Red’s Mother, sister Karen played Little Red, I played the Wolf, and Dad played the heroic Hunter who shoots the Wolf and saves Red Riding Hood. Little brother Steve was just a baby then and was not in the movie but got his own featured segment at the end of the reel.

But for all his joyful playfulness, Dad had his faults too. He sometimes drank too much, until the night he was involved in a car accident that left people in the other car injured. He left the scene of the accident. Later, with the support of our Pastor, he went to the police and turned himself in.

And he had a hair-trigger temper. Once, when the time came for the Singley’s to go to church, our mother told Dad to enroll Karen and me in Sunday School while she and baby Steve waited for him to join them in the sanctuary. This was at First Baptist Church in Worcester. Well, Karen got into her class without a hitch, but there was a problem with me. I’m not sure what it was, but my Dad got mad. Really mad. Taking me by the scruff of the neck he dragged me out to the car, threw me in the back seat, got behind the wheel and screeched out of the parking lot of the First Baptist Church. We ended up at Worcester Airport, sitting on the hood of the car, watching the planes take off and land. Sometime later Dad looked at his watch, uttered an expletive, and threw me back into the car. We screeched out of the airport, making a bee line for First Baptist Church. My mother was standing there in the church’s empty parking lot with Karen in tow and Steve cradled in her arms. They got into the car and we headed home. My mother was mad. I mean REALLY mad. They argued all the way home.

We never went back to that church. I guess that’s why I never became a Baptist.

But years later I did learn to fly.

Thanks, Dad!

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My father was not a very religious man. My mother was the spiritual center of our family. Sometime after our aborted visit to First Baptist mom suggested we try out another church – Adams Square Congregational. We loved it! My mother felt like she’d found a spiritual home. We children loved all the kid-focused activities. And my Dad…well, my non-religious Dad was asked if he’d be interested in coaching the church basketball team!

We were in!

My father was a great coach although that hair-trigger temper often landed him in trouble with referees and umpires. I think he held the record for most technical fouls in a church-league basketball season. But as fast as the anger erupted, Dad’s conscience got the better of him and the next day would phone the “offending” referee or umpire to apologize. But his ability to understand and teach the fundamentals of a sport brought him considerable coaching success. Our church basketball teams won New England Championships. When he coached my brother’s Little League team they won titles. And when he coached Babe Ruth League baseball he did something amazing.

You need to understand that my father was extremely competitive. He loved to win and hated to lose. But one day he had to make a choice, a decision about what’s really important in life and what his values really were.

The star pitcher of his team suffered a devastating injury. Fooling around with some friends in a rail yard the boy tried jumping onto a moving train. He missed. His leg was severed at the ankle. The boy, of course, was emotionally devastated. He felt his life was over.

My Dad, by this time, had started to find a relationship with God. Not knowing how to help his young pitcher move through the tragedy Dad came upon some books by members of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Dad brought the boy some of these books, but they seemed not to be helpful. One day the kid said something like, “All this sounds good. But you know as well as I do I’ll never pitch again.” My dad didn’t know what to say. Finally, he blurted, “When you get your prosthetic foot and feel ready, you’re still my Number 1 pitcher.”

I don’t know if Dad really thought the boy would actually come back but sure enough the kid did. Just as the next season was winding down when every game was crucial he came limping from the parking lot to the bench.

“I’m ready,” he said.

I saw my father’s face turn ashen. This game was so important – a must-win. And the boy was nowhere near being ready to pitch competitively. Pitching requires strong legs, especially the right leg that pushes off the rubber for a right handed pitcher. And this young right handed pitcher’s right leg was the severed limb.

Watching all this from a short distance, I could see the strain on my father’s face. He was so competitive, so needing to win. And yet he had made a promise.

All at once, my Dad took the game ball and tossed it to the boy.

“Warm up,” he said.

Well, the young man with the artificial foot pitched that game. Without strength in the injured leg he had no real speed. The other team hammered him for countless hits and runs.

But the young pitcher – making his first steps toward recovery – had a broad smile on his face. It was as if he was actually doing something he never thought he’d be able to do.

And I, watching all this from the sidelines, discovered something really wonderful about my father.

You see, the day my Dad lost was the day he truly won.

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Toward the end of his life my father’s faith became more and more central to who he was. He and my mother became involved in an organization called Faith at Work and traveled to many churches sharing their real-life stories about how God was at work in their lives.

That’s what they were doing the night he died.

He had just spoken to the group, sharing with them his amazing story about the grace of Jesus Christ at work in his life. Walking back to where my mom was seated my Dad smiled.

And then he went home to God.

It was November 2, 1973.

Today I am 17 years older than my Dad lived to be.

Imagine that.

Because he died so suddenly I never got a chance to say goodbye or tell him what he meant to me. If it was possible to go back and take care of that I think I’d say something like this:

“I only hope I can be as good a father – and a Man – as you.”

Happy Father’s Day, Dad.

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Four generations of Singley men: Dad, me, my son Peter, and grandson Ryan