The day that changed my life

I'm trying to think how old I was standing in the gauntlet to shake his hand. I know I was rather small and my father had to push me through the people so I could be out front. It was the summer before the 1960 election. I didn't know how much that day would effect my life.

It was only a hand shake but he was going to be the president in just a few months. My Uncle Tom Saks an engineer from Ford Motor Company, brought us to this event. I think it was one of the only events like this my father and I every went to. I didn't understand politics just yet and my father was one to read about it in the news paper and comment about everything at the dinner table.

This day also effected my father and he loved telling everyone how he had to bend down with his back back to shake my hand. It was a injury from WWII. He was hurt in WWII and got a Purple Heart like my father did. They both belonged to the D.A.V. I think he had a genetic problem with his back also. I seem to stop the guys from walking down the gauntlet of people and they stopped at me. He bent down and shook my little hand and commented as he stood back up, "Here's a future democrat." It was my hand, not a big deal I'm sure he shook many young peoples hands. All the guys with him and the people around us all laughed. Little did he know how that hand shake would effect me, my life. I believed in fairness to all. Everyone deserved to be treated the same as equals.

Three more years he would be dead and how that would effect me. My father almost took off work so we could drive to Washington for the funeral. It was TV's big moment, Sending a signal across the country so everyone on all the networks could watch and be part of the funeral. I remember kneeling as my mother lead us in the "Rosary." There was so many wet eyes all across the country

It was around this time also did I learn about other people. Why didn't they get treated the same? We were kids playing in the creek with a couple paper cups catching frogs to inspect them and toss them back in the water. It was sort of a bridge a couple pipes that the water went through and a road over the top of the pipes. This was a fourth of July event put on by the vets club my father and many others all belonged to. The Veterans of Foreign Wars, The VFW, they put on a lot of events through the year. They had Christmas doings. All sorts of things like that for the families. Then there was those days where they got together for a beer or two. Jerry Ford would stop by and buy a round or two of drinks for everyone. My mother did Betty's hair where she worked. Was really odd how the grownup got all defensive. It was our fathers and there fathers. Us kids, well we were just kids and didn't see anything wrong catching frogs in the creek. We were laughing and having a great time until the fathers came running down. Us kids were looking at each other as our parent took us back to the picnic area we were at.  We waved at each other as we were pulled along. We didn't say much just waves to our new friends who we were having a great time with until the parents showed up. We were just kids we didn't know that white kids and colored kids couldn't play together. Who made up these stupid rules? We were just kids having fun and that's all that mattered to us. We didn't care about anything else. Just kids playing making friends nothing else.

Grand Rapids, what a wonderful little town. Well, it was growing, slowly. My father would take us on the Sunday drive. I like that driving along the river and listening to my father talk about catching fish and frogs. We would see the mounds of the Native Americans. I thought that was exciting. We would stop at a ranger station and it had all the info on the mounds and the things they have found. I'm still wishing I would have found arrow heads. Just not my luck.

My father would talk about the big ship that used to sail up the Grand River. We had American Seating and they went through a lot of wood. The Catholic School I went to look down into the factory where you heard the saw ad sanders going. The smells of fresh cut wood was always so nice and pleasant to smell.