Hess: John Charles

The following are words that I shared at my fathers funeral.

Dad was born 31 March 1925 in Englewood New Jersey to Frank and Marie Kuba Hess, the first son after five daughters.  He was also the first to be born in a hospital. Two years later his younger brother was born.  He went through 8th grade in the Old Tappan Grammar School and then apprenticed as a skilled carpenter.  He had a great love for nature, and spent much of his younger life farming.  On 10 October 1948 he married Jeanne Post.  They then moved to Florida where they had a farm.  A year later, on 28 November 1949, their first daughter was born, Elizabeth or Betty.  They continued farming for several years in both Florida in the winters and near Hudson New York in the summers.  When the time came for their second child to be born they decided to return to Sparkill New York, and on 26 October 1953 their second daughter, Karen was born.  At that time dad left farming and went into carpentry.  Most of us only remember him as a carpenter.  Three years later their only son John (Me) was born on 14 Oct 1956, and then four years later their last child, a daughter, Jayne was born on 24 Sept 1960.

Personally, I don’t remember much of what happened before this time.  Around the time of Jayne’s birth, my parents bought their first home.   It was on Kings Highway in Sparkill.  I remember both of my parents working hard to get the house ready for us to live there.

Although my father quit farming, he could never give it up.  He always had as large of a garden as he could, in the space he had.  He would spend as much time as he could in his garden.  In the summers, he would wake up at daybreak and go out to the garden and work for an hour before breakfast and the heat of the day.  He would then go to work for the day and come home only to return to the garden before dinner and then again after dinner until dark.

I remember that for many years he worked five days a week for Al Turk & Son as a roofer. On Saturdays, he worked other jobs on his own or with his friend Jerry Guarino.  Eventually, he just started working completely on his own.

One of Dad’s customers was Russell & Dorothy Hogg.  Dad did a lot of work on their home in Nyack and also their summer home in Rhode Island.  They indicated how special they felt Dad was.  Dorothy said “Frank would remind me that we only wanted him to change 2 windows, and we kept coming up with more and more for him to do.  It was like he was our personal carpenter.”

Cousin Frank also benefited from dad’s labors in the same way.  Dad worked for him for several years every Saturday.  They worked from room to room in first one house and then another.  Both Dad and cousin Frank enjoyed the time they spent together.

Betty reminded me that when we were young and had a bad dream, dad would come in to our rooms and comfort us and help us get back to sleep.  He had a quiet way of reassuring us and helping us to settle down.

In elementary school, when we had problems with homework we would usually go to mom, but if it was math, dad was the one we went to.  He was amazing with fractions and the addition and multiplication tables.

When I was in about fourth grade I realized I had about as much formal education as my dad had.  Little did I realize until years later when I was working side by side with him, how much knowledge he had of construction, and other practical matters.  I had great respect of his quiet way of teaching us.

Dad was amazing, he was the only person I know who could snore through a whole television program, and then be able to tell you the whole plot.

When I was 16 I started to work with dad.  Not only did I learn a lot about carpentry, I learned about dad.  He was a quiet person who didn’t want any of the attention.  He worked hard his whole life, and was honest in his dealings.  He was generous with what he had.  When we asked him what he wanted for Christmas or his birthday he would always answer “just be good” or “I don’t need anything”.

He loved my mother’s mother – Nana to our kids.  He would help her in any way he could without a complaining word or second thought.  There were also other widows and single senior women that he helped.  I remember going and changing screens and storm windows or delivering firewood with him to “Aunt” Emma, “Aunt” Kathleen “Aunt” Marion & others.

Our cousin Scott said “If you could get Uncle Frank to talk, he was really a funny guy.”  He really did like to tease.  I think that is a trait he passed on.

Dads’ favorite color was green.  He was really happy with his green trucks.  When the first one died in 1974 he went to pick out a new one, and they just happened to have a green one on the lot.  I think they knew he was going to need a new truck and ordered one for him.  He used the same green color to mark his tools so he knew which ones were his.  Really, I think his love of green was tied to his love for growing things.

When mom and dad finally retired and they found the land in Lounsberry he was so happy to finally get his farm.  He decided he needed several garden plots, an orchard and berry bushes.  He was so happy when he planted those teeny little fruit trees and the pine trees down the driveway, we thought he was crazy.  But as full grown trees, they brought him lots of pleasure.  He loved to see things grow.  He was excited when he could use one of the pine trees as a Christmas tree for all to see the lights from the highway.

He always fed the birds.  He made sure they were taken care of in the winter.   He made houses for them for the summers.  In his later years when he didn’t have the stamina to work a full day, or when the weather was bad, he would spend much of his breaks sitting in the family room where he had a view of the bird feeders.  He had his bird book next to him and really worried when the birds didn’t have food in the feeder.

He had a great love for nature.  As a gardener, he had one nemesis, woodchucks.  He tried many ways to get rid of them.   The first was the “Hav-a-heart” traps he used in Sparkill.  Unfortunately, I think he caught more skunks than woodchucks.  He would take the skunks for a ride to a mountainous state land and let them go.  I think for several years he caught 17 or more.  The woodchucks weren’t always so lucky.

He loved his grandkids.  You can see that in the pictures on these boards.  When he was with kids he was smiling.  Tyler said “I only remember PopPop being mad once.  And that was when I used the garage remote to put the door down when he was putting the car in the garage (it came down on top of the car).  And then he was mad for only a few seconds.”

I received a card yesterday which has a verse which is how I feel about my dad.

Our Father’s depart,

But never their love and never the lessons they’ve taught us.

Never their guidance,

Never their blessings,

Never the joys they’ve brought us.

 

In Corinthians it reads,

The Father of compassion…comforts us in all our troubles.

 Though we try to prepare, we are never prepared enough,

But there is a compassionate God in heaven

Who sees, Who cares, Who comforts.

May we feel His presence as we grieve the loss of our father, our grandfather, our husband, our friend.