Christmas Eve with the Old Man (12/24/2020)

And in the Night of death,

Hope sees a star,

And listening love hears the rustle of a wing

Robert Ingersoll

It was Christmas Eve and Philadelphia International airport had just announced that all flights were cancelled. Suddenly, Air Force Staff Sergeant Charles Parker felt a pit in his stomach. The chances of making his connecting flight in Dayton was slipping away faster than the icy airport runway. There was perhaps one last chance. After he overheard an elderly gentleman inquire from the clerk where the car-rental counters were, the servicemen sheepishly asked the man if he would be driving the entire 400-mile trip. When the old man responded in the affirmative the serviceman asked him for a ride. After he explained that he had been oversees for two years and needed to make a connecting flight in order to reach his final destination in Utah, the old man agreed.

The old man introduced himself as Wayne. When he spoke to the Sergeant, he sported a big smile revealing a big gap between his front two teeth. The sergeant also noticed that he spoke with a lisp. Wayne was physically imposing and a bit intimidating. He stood just over six feet tall and weighed about two-hundred pounds. He was a stocky man with broad shoulders. The man sported a thick head of gray and looked upon the world through a pair of steely rimmed glasses. He was dressed in a double-knit blazer and white shirt with a tie displaying scarlet and gray stripes. Small-town Oho born and bred, he told the service man that he was born on Valentine's Day 1913 in Clifton Ohio but raised in Newcomerstown, Ohio. Wayne's best friend was his older brother Ike. They wrestled, boxed and played many other sports together. Ike would go on to be an All-American football player at Iowa State. Sadly, Ike died at age forty-three. His sister, Mary was a vaudeville actress. He was the youngest of the three. While living in Newcomerstown Wayne became friendly with the legendary Cy Young who was always happy to give him friendly advice. Wayne attended college at Dennison University in Ohio majoring in English and History. He wanted to be an educator like his father who began teaching at age fifteen then rose to the position of school superintendent in Newcomerstown, Ohio. The old man gave his father the credit for passing on his love of books; for Wayne was a voracious reader.

His first teaching job was instructing English to remedial learners in the seventh grade. Wayne felt that these children were not slow learners but neglected. He liked his students and he felt they liked him as well. He told Dave Parker that after all these years he still considered himself a teacher. Dave soon realized that he was in the company of an extremely intelligent man.

As the ride progressed the avuncular man talked non-stop about an array of topics from military history, poetry, and politics. His favorite general was George Patton. During their drive Wayne would re-create battles fought by Patton as if he were actually present. According to the old man, Patton's only weakness was in public relations. He simply could not get along with the press. He continued his lecture by schooling the servicemen on the Battle of Thermopylae quoting from memory the Spartan King Leonidas. He spoke of William the Conqueror, Alexander the Great and the campaigns of Julius Caesar. The Air Force serviceman was in the presence of a true Renaissance man.

The old man was as antiquated as they come. Always a politically conservative republican, as far as he was concerned there is no difference between the evils of smoking marijuana and using heroin. He told the young man how highly he thought of President Nixon. He said that he believed that history would regard Nixon as one of our greatest presidents. The old man could not accept Nixon's crime exhorting Sergeant Parker on the Watergate scandal and leaving him with the impression that he had a personal friendship with the president.

Sergeant Parker's riding companion went on to condemn the tearing down of heroes in America. Calling Abraham Lincoln, the greatest man who ever lived. He continued to chastise those who have tarnished every single president since George Washington. With intensity he stated that he wouldn't be surprised one day they would get Lincoln too. The staff sergeant listened carefully as the old man said that a civilization without heroes isn't going to be a civilization much longer.

During their trip the old man lectured on his life's philosophy that "You are either getting better or you are getting worse." The serviceman could have filled a note book with the old man's sayings such as, "You are never, never staying the same", "Don't outsmart them, outwork them", and one of his favorites was a quote from his hero Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Do more tomorrow than you have done today." He also spoke of the importance of "paying it forward". Throughout their long ride the serviceman was happy to sit and listen as the old man quoted from Patton, Shakespeare, and even the U.S. Marine Corps training manual.

He spoke affectionately of how he first met his wife Anne when she was twenty-three-years old. Anne Gross worked as a millinery saleswoman. The old man admitted to being nervous around women. They met at the home of a mutual friend who would later introduce Wayne to Anne over the phone. Abruptly, Wayne asked her out on a date but Anne declined because she already had a date for the evening. In time they became friends and then went on to more serious dating. In 1942, before leaving for the navy and after six years of courting, he proposed to Anne. They were married on June 19th, 1942.

The serviceman soon learned that the two shared a common bond , their military service. The old man had served in the Navy during World War II as a lieutenant commander on the USS Rinehart. He had presided over a destroyer escort in the Pacific. The old man had joined the Navy because he felt it was his duty. He enlisted five months before the attack on Pearl Harbor.

At the end of their journey the Staff Sergeant thanked Wayne for the ride and getting him to his destination with time to spare. The old man replied that if you give me enough of a lead, I can beat Jessie Owens in a hundred-yard dash. After the two departed the staff sergeant reflected upon their trip and realized that Wayne had done the vast majority of the talking. The young man felt that Wayne did not learn very much about his life but he knew a great deal about Wayne's. But there was much more the young serviceman did not know.

The old man was a larger than life figure who never forgot his friends and those who were loyal to him. He helped them find jobs, make business connections, and was always willing to reach into his own pocket to offer financial help. If a friend was in need of a car ride, the old man would give him the keys to his own car. The old man was a winner and everybody loves a winner. He would be invited to speak at clubs, high schools, graduation commencements. For this he was paid; sometimes handsomely but he would never keep the money. Instead, he would give it back to the club or donate it to a hospital or other charity. You see, the old man was never interested in financial rewards. Throughout his life he has paid many visits to hospitals and nursing homes, always stopping to visit with a sick child or elderly man to see how they are doing. His casual call would often be better medicine than any pill that could be prescribed. The old man was once invited to give a lecture on World War One at the University of Southern California. Because of his knowledge of military history and ongoing popularity, the old man hosted the broadcast of six World War II films in early 1980 at a local TV station. He also hosted a weekly television show that ran longer than both Lassie and Ed Sullivan. He not only developed a friendship with President Nixon but President Gerald Ford as well. The old man was also friendly with Congressman Jack kemp who wrote a tribute to him in the Congressional Record of the U.S. House of Representatives.

March 17, 1987

As the retired Charles Parker sat in his "easy chair" tuning the television to WBNS for the local news broadcast, he was surprised instead to be greeted by his Commander in Chief. Former President Richard Nixon stood at a podium in front of an alter displaying a black cap, folded U.S. flag and a silver vase containing a single red rose. He was delivering a eulogy at the First Community Church in Grand View, Ohio to a capacity crowd of fourteen hundred people. Many of these people were in line at 1:30 P.M. for a 2:30 P.M. service.

The thirty-seventh president talked about how he met the deceased over thirty-years ago. The former president wanted to talk about football but his friend wanted to discuss foreign policy. What did they talk about? Foreign policy of course. Nixon referred to his old friend as a renaissance man, a man with a great sense of history. Nixon talked about how his friend was misperceived as a tyrant but was really a "softy" and good-hearted person, citing the time his friend ran a phone-a-thon raising thousands of dollars for crippled children. The president ended the eulogy quoting his old friend stating, "if you take no risks, you will suffer no defeats but if you take no risks, you will win no victories". Nixon called his friend a great humanitarian.

The words of the former president struck a chord in Charles Parker's mind taking him back to that cold Christmas Eve night. Parker now realized that Richard Nixon was eulogizing the old man. As the program concluded he watched in disbelief as photo faded onto the screen. There in full view wearing a black cap, scarlet shirt cradling a football was the old man. The caption read: Wayne Woodrow Hayes 1913 - 1987.

The following day more than fifteen thousand people took part in a memorial service at Ohio Stadium for legendary Ohio State football coach Woody Hayes.