or, at the very least, finally launch a rocket toward the ISS, here’s the eulogy I planned to read at my father’s memorial service today:
EULOGY FOR DAD by Rick Hill – 20th May 2012
Guten Tag! My father taught me that a good speech should start with an anecdote or joke to set the tone. Following in my father’s footsteps as an academician, I looked up the history of the eulogy to find something, a nugget of wisdom or bit of humour to share with you. What I found is that the eulogy’s purpose has changed through the years, from a serious tribute in ancient times to a light-hearted roast of the recently deceased, especially after 9/11. Instead of telling one of my jokes, I’ll let some of Dad’s words speak for him through emails he sent me over the years. I knew him as Dad. You may have known him as Richard or, more recently, e[…]@yahoo.com. Here are some of the insightful quotes and personal stories he told me via computer. He often forwarded jokes to me. Mainly military-related but here’s one with a musical theme.
When Beethoven passed away, he was buried in a churchyard. A couple days later, the town drunk was walking through the cemetery and heard some strange noise coming from the area where Beethoven was buried. Terrified, the drunk ran and got the priest to come and listen to it. The priest bent close to the grave and heard some faint, unrecognizable music coming from the grave. Frightened, the priest ran and got the town magistrate.
When the magistrate arrived, he bent his ear to the grave, listened for a moment, and said, “Ah, yes, that’s Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, being played backwards.”
He listened a while longer, and said, “There’s the Eighth Symphony, and it’s backwards, too. Most puzzling.” So the magistrate kept listening; “There’s the Seventh… the Sixth… the Fifth…”
Suddenly the realization of what was happening dawned on the magistrate; he stood up and announced to the crowd that had gathered in the cemetery, “My fellow citizens, there’s nothing to worry about. It’s just Beethoven decomposing.”
Dad had his opinions, expressing very strongly his support for national defense. For instance, he sent me a political cartoon of a man and his son standing next to a military graveyard on Memorial Day, with a bubble of thoughts above the man’s head: “You military heroes gave us all your tomorrows so I could have mine.”
On that theme, many of you know Dad was sworn in to U.S. Army on October 26th, 1954.
He wrote me about “a 1955 USArmy ‘adventure’ of my own in West Germany. I had to guard a guy in civilian clothes who had entered our secure area on a motorcycle. My assignment? Escort him to the MPs by riding on the back of his motorcycle seat, he driving. I was armed with an M-1. He could have easily dislodged me and rode on. Thankfully he did not!”
Dad lived in Fountain City, Tennessee, in the north part of Knoxville. When he was a child, trolley cars still traveled from the city into the suburbs. As my father said, though,
“In my young years I was told that the horse owned by my Granddad, Frank Eldridge, had race horse blood (i.e., bloodline). He would not let another horse-drawn vehicle pass him. He would speed up on his own to prevent that. That must have been the ‘hot-rodding’ of the day. My grandmother, Mamaw, was known as a fast driver of the ‘horse and buggy’ and the Model T Ford that succeeded the horse, so fast driving must be in our blood as well!
Horse and Model T were gone before my birth. We walked!” My father took me on fast rides in his Triumph TR-3 when I was five, often accompanied by friends my age crowded into the backseat.
Dad also taught me to fish when I was five. 35 years later, I taught him how to send email. More importantly, I introduced him to Solitaire. He liked Solitaire, keeping written records of high scores for the next 15 years. There are still Post-It notes on his computer desk of his highest scores and the dates. For instance, 10,641 points scored in 70 seconds on 3/1/2008.
Dad had many interests. I emailed him, inquiring about his days at UT when he more than once was a broadcaster for the classical music station there. He said, “I was a student member of the radio club associated with WUOT. George Bradfute, Phil’s brother, was a member of the WUOT engineer staff when he was an undergrad at UT circa 1948- . “
Boy Scouts — Dad helped me with my merit badges, wanting me to earn Eagle Scout, an honour he never received in youth; in so doing, he taught me respect for uniform and authority. Well, not for every official organization, however; Dad briefly considered getting cremated only because he wanted me to mail his ashes to the IRS with a note that read “Now you have everything.”
We once took a father/son trip to Williamsburg, Jamestown, Norfolk and Cape Hatteras. Dad wanted to spend time with me to review our country’s history while he shared childhood memories so he could tell me about his own father’s influence upon him, a man who proudly served in the US Navy for 29 years and was stationed at Norfolk in WWII. I best remember a woodcarver’s shop near Cape Hatteras, where a third-generation bird carver was also a barber like his grandfather, whom we had met when I was a child. The grandson admitted he was better at shaving heads than blocks of wood.
Along the line of family history, I asked Dad if he knew the education level that his parents, grandparents and great-grandparents completed in primary or secondary school?
Dad was born Richard Horace Capps and later changed his name to Richard Lee Hill, aligned with the career Navy man, Lee Bruce Hill, who was more of a father to Dad than his birth father. Dad said his Mother, Thelma May Eldridge Capps Hill Hirth, received her BA from Carson-Newman College and became a teacher. His birth father, James Horace Capps, got a HS degree as far as Dad knew. His maternal grandfather, Frank Lee Eldridge, completed 6th grade, and went on to work for the Southern Railway Company. His maternal grandmother, Lucy Margaret Pope Eldridge, born in 1887, completed high school plus business school, working as a stenographer. He did not know the education that his paternal grandparents or great-grandparents on either side achieved, meaning they were probably laborers more than professionals like lawyers, doctors or business management.
Dad and I took several father/son trips to race events:
- IndyCars in Long Beach and Charlotte; Vintage Cars in Mid-Ohio, including a stable of Triumph TR-3s like the one Dad owned.
- We saw several NASCAR races in Bristol such as Richard Petty’s last race in 1992. Dad took me to Daytona when I was probably 2 or 3, too young to remember.
- More recently, we watched races at local tracks such as Huntsville, with our last trip together to the Kingsport Speedway on Nov. 7, 2009.
- Many people here can attest to Dad’s affinity for local tracks, from Myrtle Beach to south Florida.
He was known as “Cool Dad” to my high school classmates; he chaperoned bus trips, and is still famous for his callouts such as “What’s my favorite phrase?” Answer: “Free beer”; and “What’s my favorite beer?” Answer: “Coors.” My friends also remember the portable computer Dad brought to high school classes in 1979 and 1980, a contraption with flashing lights, dials and digital displays that taught energy conservation, formally known as the “Personal Energy Cost and Conservation Simulator,” Dad functioning as an assistant professor/extension specialist for Va. Tech at the time.
Dad showed, rather than lectured me, how to be a gentleman and scholar — never put anyone down, because talents are not always visible and may only show themselves when we need them most, such as in an emergency situation. He reminded me often that the Boy Scout motto, “Be prepared,” is true everywhere and all the time. Respect a woman’s equal talents but still offer to open a door for women. Assist the elderly and those less fortunate.
He was a member of Delta Tau Delta fraternity and wanted me to be a legacy. I pledged but didn’t join. It was the same for Masons. I joined DeMolay but was so involved in Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, always in uniform and working to be a good Scout in Dad’s eyes, that I gave little time for other organizational duties. Dad seemed to understand and concentrated his efforts on me accordingly.
I never knew what Dad really thought of me so I often sought his approval by emulating him, having taught a few classes at ITT Tech a couple of years ago to give back to the community what Dad had given me. While I was at ITT Tech, I asked Dad about the types of classes he taught at ETSU over his 23 years there. He gave me a few examples:
- Technology and Society in 2008
- Industrial Supervision in 2009
- Student in University from 2007 to 2010
- Technical Communication in 2008 and again in 2010
Dad embraced new technology but wanted us to know he was a sixth-generation descendant of Col. John Sawyers, Revolutionary War hero of the Southern battlefields, who was born in 1745 and later resided in Sullivan County before moving to Emory Road north of Knoxville, after having lived on Long Island as a soldier and “Indian fighter.”
Which brings us to here, in this church. According to the book, Family history of Col. John Sawyers and Simon Harris, and their descendants, written in 1913 by Dr. Madison Monroe Harris, a great grandson of Sawyers, “Our ancestors were Presbyterians, and they lived and acted out the principles and doctrines of the original Presbyterian Church.”
That says a lot right there. But Dad would want me to point out an even more personal note. The book also details, “In person, Colonel Sawyers was fully six feet in height, weighing in the neighborhood of two hundred pounds. His complexion was fair, had bright red hair and possessed the traditional long red whiskers characteristic of the Sawyers family. Withal, he was a commanding figure.”
Some of you might remember I used to have bright red hair. More importantly, I’m glad to know people can look at me and immediately recognize my father’s commanding figure in my features.
His love for and friendship with my mother brought us here together to celebrate the life of a great man. May we carry on his legacy, each in our own special way.
As Dad would say, Vielen Dank und Auf wiedersehen. Thank you and goodbye.
treetrunkdings 