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OT: Thinking of my dad today.

12 years ago for me. I miss him every day. And I lost him 7 months after my brother passed away in a car accident. That was a bad year and I lost my two go to guys for everything. My dad was a huge Penn State fan and we watched games together all the time. That's why I can never stop watching Penn State games even as pissed as I get at the BOT and the rest of the clown show that is our university leadership.
 
19 years for me. He lived his life in his terms and made a decision not to live going to doctors constantly and living just to live. Died of a massive heart attack while drinking a beer at his regular watering hole, falling right off the back of the stool. Can't imagine him picking a different way to go.
 
Talked to my brother as he was visiting my 89 year old Mom in Austin this morning.

Wished him a Happy Father's Day and told him how great I thought he has done over the years with his three.....we both agreed our Dad set a great great example. We lost him on 1/31/14 at age 86. Life's never been the same.
 
Unfortunate. That had to be painful.

We have something almost in common (I'm sorry:)). I was a 16 year old senior in high school when my dad was 65 and had just retired.
Please accept my condolences for our almost commonality.;) We have a 16 year-old daughter and I get paranoid just thinking about it. She seems so young. It was rough. I was then floored when my mother died my freshman year of college. I was fortunate to have had so much support though.
 
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34 years ago for me. He was 49, passed away my freshman year at PSU. God Damn cancer. The local PSU club got together and gave my family tickets to the Alabama game that fall so he could see his son march in Beaver Stadium before he passed. I will never forget it. Miss him every day.
 
34 years ago for me. He was 49, passed away my freshman year at PSU. God Damn cancer. The local PSU club got together and gave my family tickets to the Alabama game that fall so he could see his son march in Beaver Stadium before he passed. I will never forget it. Miss him every day.


Cancer...terrible way to go. Mom..never drank, smoked..cancer of tongue & throat...horrific to watch.
 
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The old man was a WWII Navy vet and one of the toughest SOBs to ever walk the earth. Saw him cry twice in his life; when his mother passed and when my mother died. A simple man who had a rough childhood growing up during the depression and later fighting off Jap kamikaze planes in the South Pacific. His only major flaw was being a diehard Pitt fan, but fortunately he forgave his only son for being a Penn Stater.
 
My dad passed in October 1994. The funeral was on the day of tOSU game. I still haven't watched that game.... and likely never will.
 
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A suggestion for those fortunate enough to still have your fathers around. My wife and I purchased a book of questions for our kids to ask their grandparents about their life growing up. When my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer my wife and I spent his last days asking him questions from the book (my kids were still too young). My dad really enjoyed answering the questions and I learned a lot of things I didn't know.

I don't have the book in front of me but here are a few things I remember:
  • Where were your born? I knew the town but he answered "the poor farm".
  • Who was your doctor? The doctor came by horse but my dad was already born by the time he arrived. The doctor checked out my grandmother, the family fed him and put him up for the night, gave him a couple of dollars and he left in the morning.
  • What was your first job after high school? My dad and his brother bought an old sawmill and powered it with an old Model A Ford engine. They cut hardwood and sold it to a shoe maker for heels in women's shoes.
  • Where did you get married? Your mother and I drove to Maryland and got married by a justice of the peace.
  • Where did you go on your honeymoon? We didn't have any money so I went back to my place and she went back to her place.
  • What was your first car? It was a model A Ford but my dad enjoyed making a list of every car he ever owned.
The whole thing was fascinating. I knew more about the more current stories. My father worked in construction and built his first house. On his death bed he recalled using oak floor joists that weren't level so he ran a chalk line and planed them by hand. He said he could remember the pain in his arm of driving nails into the hardwood (as opposed to pine). He built the house after work but some of his co-workers came to help him on weekends.

My father got an associates degree in his 50s and was a very successful businessman. The smartest man I ever knew and one of three heroes in my life. I love you and miss you dad.
 
8 Years for me. Many days I wish I could pick up the phone and ask for advice again. Took him to the 2005 OSU game at Beaver Stadium. I never heard him yell that loud at a football game before! So glad he went with me because it was rare for him to want to deal with large crowds.
 
A suggestion for those fortunate enough to still have your fathers around. My wife and I purchased a book of questions for our kids to ask their grandparents about their life growing up. When my father was diagnosed with terminal cancer my wife and I spent his last days asking him questions from the book (my kids were still too young). My dad really enjoyed answering the questions and I learned a lot of things I didn't know.

I don't have the book in front of me but here are a few things I remember:
  • Where were your born? I knew the town but he answered "the poor farm".
  • Who was your doctor? The doctor came by horse but my dad was already born by the time he arrived. The doctor checked out my grandmother, the family fed him and put him up for the night, gave him a couple of dollars and he left in the morning.
  • What was your first job after high school? My dad and his brother bought an old sawmill and powered it with an old Model A Ford engine. They cut hardwood and sold it to a shoe maker for heels in women's shoes.
  • Where did you get married? Your mother and I drove to Maryland and got married by a justice of the peace.
  • Where did you go on your honeymoon? We didn't have any money so I went back to my place and she went back to her place.
  • What was your first car? It was a model A Ford but my dad enjoyed making a list of every car he ever owned.
The whole thing was fascinating. I knew more about the more current stories. My father worked in construction and built his first house. On his death bed he recalled using oak floor joists that weren't level so he ran a chalk line and planed them by hand. He said he could remember the pain in his arm of driving nails into the hardwood (as opposed to pine). He built the house after work but some of his co-workers came to help him on weekends.

My father got an associates degree in his 50s and was a very successful businessman. The smartest man I ever knew and one of three heroes in my life. I love you and miss you dad.
There are so many things my dad and I never talked about... he was a relatively quiet man and I wasn't mature enough to ask him about certain things. It makes me very sad to think about it....
 
It will be 40 years for me on June 29. He was 63. I was 16 years old. My mother died less than 2 years later at the age of 58. I was 18.
Brutal. They had to have done a great job raising you in the short time they had for you to have recovered from that and excelled. Kudos to them...and to you.
 
It will be 12 years this week for my dad. He lived to 95 so we had him a long time. He certainly had his flaws but he was still a great father. Lots of memories from my youth. We'd hunt small game in the fall on Saturday mornings and listened to PSU games on the radio on the long drive home.
 
Eleven years gone.

O'Neill: "A brave, kind, sweet man. There was never a braver or finer."
Happy Fathers Day to everyone. My father died 47 yrs ago. I was 6, my brother 3. My mom was the lioness, no pun intended. She is one tough cookie. Never missed football games in HS or college for both of us. Got both of us through college, and flying in the right direction. We didn't have two cents to rub together, but we didn't miss anything. Somehow she figured out how to get us PSU tix in the mid 70's.

You all are lucky to have gotten to know your father.

Happy Fathers Day Mom!!!
 
I lost my father in January. He was a great man, reminded me of Joe. The Rose Bowl was on his birthday, called him briefly to talk about how Penn State was back. 2 days later, he went into hospice and never recovered.

thank you all for sharing your memories. it helps.
 
My dad passed in 1993, the Friday before the USC game. My wife (mostly) and I handled the funeral arrangements. When leaving the funeral director's, we asked if it would be OK to go to the game and he said "sure, you've taken care of what needed to be done here". I remember PS going ahead by a couple TDs, but USC came back to make it a one point game. PS won 21-20. We both knew that he would have wanted us to go.
 
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Eleven years gone.

O'Neill: "A brave, kind, sweet man. There was never a braver or finer."

I feel ya, man. Going on 12 years for me.

Pop became a Penn Stater because of me. Prior to me, he was only a Notre Dame fan. Why? Well, before and after The War, he could relate to Notre Dame because it was a Catholic University and usually the best cfb team in the nation. Pop was Catholic, of course. My best times with him were drinking coffee and reading the paper after mass.

People forget, back then, Catholics were still frowned upon by WASP"s. Pop followed The Yankees, too, mostly because of DiMaggio and Berra.

He followed Joe Paterno a lot more because of me. He liked Scott Paterno, too. Used to joke with me that he knew the Paterno family must know how to cook when you look at Scott.

I wish he were still alive so I could hear him say one more time (when I take more than 10 minutes in the shower), "HEY! You better not be masterbating in the shower, again!":D

 
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I feel ya, man. Going on 12 years for me.

Pop became a Penn Stater because of me. Prior to me, he was only a Notre Dame fan. Why? Well, before and after The War, he could relate to Notre Dame because it was a Catholic University and usually the best cfb team in the nation. Pop was Catholic, of course. My best times with him were drinking coffee and reading the paper after mass.

People forget, back then, Catholics were still frowned upon by WASP"s. Pop followed The Yankees, too, mostly because of DiMaggio and Berra.

He followed Joe Paterno a lot more because of me. He liked Scott Paterno, too. Used to joke with me that he knew the Paterno family must know how to cook when you look at Scott.

I wish he were still alive so I could hear him say one more time (when I take more than 10 minutes in the shower), "HEY! You better not be masterbating in the shower, again!":D

Daily, it seems, I would ask my dad if I could read HIS evening newspaper. He'd say, "Yeah, but make sure you bring it back the way you found it (in order and tidy)." I've never, ever forgotten those words and am reminded of them often.
 
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