There is absolutely nothing in the world greater than a visting
a life-long friend.
I journeyed to South Lyon, Michigan on Tuesday, August 2 and did
just that.
Bob “Satch” Kasper and I have been friends since we started
first grade at Sts. Peter and Paul School. That’s 83 years ago!
We have had reunions in Michigan, including at Bob’s Presque
Isle summer home on Grand Lake; in West Virginia; in Ohio, at my Tallmadge,
Ohio home; and in Florida, several times, when we ran into each other during
our vacations to the Sunshine State.
The late Fairmont Times editor and columnist John Veasey once
wrote about the Bob/John friendship with the headline: A Lifelong Friendship
Shown by Holiday Cards.
This is how the Veasey column began:
In 1995 Bob Kasper, working at Ford Motor Co.
and living in Inkster, Michigan, mailed a Christmas card to John Olesky,
working for the Daily Mail newspaper and living in Charleston, that talked of
remembering old times, old friends. He signed it "Bob."
John thought it was a good idea and sent a
different card with the same sentiments and suggested that the two Monongah
High Class of 1950 graduates keep sending the same two cards to each other on
alternate years. He signed it "John & Monia."
Well, this year each card has 55 years of
names on it.
It has recorded marriages, Bob's to Pat, and
Bob & John's children to others. And births, 2 children for Bob and Pat and
3 for John and Monia. And 7 grandchildren for John and 4 for Bob. And 1
great-grandson for John.
And deaths -- John's wife Monia in 2004 and
Bob's wife Pat in 2008.
Their careers took them to Michigan, West
Virginia, Ohio and Florida, but the cards found them wherever they lived.
A clipping of that article adorns my den wall today.
The two Christmas cards are like family Bibles, recording
births, marriages and deaths.
This time Bob’s son, Steven and Steven’s wife Cindy, joined me,
my daughter LaQuita and her husband Tom.
We chatted about the ol’ days at Monongah High, our exploits with
the facetiously named Gang That Terrorized Marion County.
And I explained to Steve how Bob got his gang nickname of Satch.
Huntz Hall, who starred with Leo Gorcey in “The Dead Ends Kids” and the same
cast in “The Bowery Boys” always wore a cap that played a slap-‘em role in the
film.
Bob constantly wore a cap so we called him Satch. The name stuck
even though Huntz Hall’s character, I just found out today, was Sach, not
Satch. Oh, well, an error that lasted 60 years. Spelling was not our strong
suit back then.
Steve and Cindy have 6 children – 4 that Steve adopted and 2
that Cindy had.
The six of us had an outstanding dinner at the Lyons End
Restaurant.
It was at if the 83 years started a week ago.
Later, LaQuita, Tom and I spent the day on Put-in-Bay, a Lake
Erie island, before I returned home to Paula, my love for 17 years (after my
wife, My Mona Lisa, passed away in 2004.
As the Christmas Card that Satch mailed to me in 1955, which we
still exchange every Christmas along with the one that I sent to him in
response to his card in 1955, says:
Old Days, Old Times, Old Friends
Which will happen to me again on Saturday, September 4 when I
attend the Monongah High Alumni Banquet at the Knights of Columbus in Fairmont.
I hope to see you there.
Mail Reservations by August 26 deadline and
a check made out to
Monongah High Alumni Association
for
$30 per person to
Donna Davis
858 Park Avenue
Monongah, WV
26554-1143
If you send in your Reservation then you, too, can enjoy Old
Days, Old Times, Old Friends.
And be as golden as I was when I visited Bob/Satch.
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