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Jul. 9th, 2008
I am Chris Hansen, Dick’s eldest nephew. I’d like to thank everyone for coming here today to honour Dick’s life.
Louis Richard Child was born on February 3, 1929, in Lynn, the son of Harold and Jennie Child. He was thus a Depression baby.
Many of you may either be Depression babies, or be the children of Depression babies. People born at that time often grew up in deprivation. One thing they all learned, however, was to be frugal and generous when times were tough, and to be frugal and generous when times were good. It was all they knew.
Dick was both frugal, and generous, starting out with his military service, at the end of the Second World War. He didn’t serve in the Navy Seabees, as his brother did, or in the Navy, as my father did. He served in the Coast Guard, helping to keep our coasts free from dangerous ships and cargoes. He was, like his mother’s father before him, a sea cook.
It cut him to the quick one day when he burned an oven-full of pans of biscuits so badly that he had to tip the entire mess into the sea; they couldn’t be cleaned. It offended his frugal nature. He learned how to cook the hard way, in the military, and was (if he did say so himself) a good one. His men were always well-fed.
After the war, when he was demobilized, he attended Boston University, where he studied music, with an emphasis on the organ and piano. He got his degree in 1953, but hedged his bets. Instead of trying to make a living as a musician, he combined playing organ at St. Paul’s in Hamilton with a career as an accountant.
He was an avid golfer; his apartment is full of trophies, golf memorabilia, and books. He also loved to fish, hunt, and play poker, and had that cliché‘d quality: a good sense of humour. On top of everything else, he painted in oils. He was what the English call a “clubbable” man. He had many friends, and everyone I know who met him liked him right away.
My first memories of him are all around Christmas. Dick was the benevolent uncle who gave us each a crisp fifty-dollar bill in those cards with a pocket for a bill that showed you exactly which President or Revolutionary War hero you merited. Washington, Lincoln, Hamilton were the usual faces you saw in those cards in my family, as times were tough. But when we got our cards from Dick, we learned what Ulysses S. Grant looked like. We were quite fond of Grant.
In the early 1960’s I was fascinated with buildings, and wanted a certain construction set that I could use to build replicas of skyscrapers and the like. They were quite expensive, but I pestered my mother to get one anyway. When Christmas morning came, I got a smaller construction set from my parents, but it wasn’t the one I wanted. I pouted, as kids will do, and went to our grandparents’ place for Christmas dinner. Dick lived with his parents.
I’m sure my attitude hurt my mother, but she hid it. In Hamilton, before Christmas dinner, we were allowed to open our presents. Sober things like clothing, socks, mittens, all came from our grandparents. But a big box, with my name on it, came from Dick, and it was the construction set I wanted. There had been a conspiracy of parents with uncle, I think. Frugal, but generous. I still say a silent “sorry” to my mother’s spirit every time I think of that horrid but finally glorious Christmas.
When I was young, people always pointed out that I looked very much like Dick. Taking my entrance exam to St. John’s Prep, the school secretary, who was a friend of our family’s, was proctoring the exam and greeted my mother when she came in. Mom asked Miss Larkin whether she could pick me out of the crowd of kids who were in the room, and she pointed directly at me, saying “He looks just like your brother.” As it happens, growing older has meant that I look more like my father, and my own brother, but I hope that a little bit of the understated twinkle in my uncle’s eye has made it through the aging process.
As time went on my own life took a turn away from Massachusetts and I lost regular contact with Dick. But, each year at Christmas that generous envelope came, and we got together when we could. He lived in Ipswich, and in various places in New Hampshire, but at the last he decided to come and live with my brother, in Marblehead. He was near his family, he had his own little apartment under the main house, nice and light and airy, and he could sit at his computer and transcribe music all day, if he wanted. He said that it kept his mind active, and it seems to have worked, as he was as sharp at age 79 as he had been years before. And, I could see him, and have a little 4pm libation with him, whenever I visited.
I would give him computer advice, and he proudly showed me the compositions he had transcribed. But his computer was slow, and he thought that something was wrong with it, because the sound wasn’t quite right.
Last Christmas I finally had the chance to pay him back for all the gifts he had so generously given me and the rest of my family over the decades. I went to Best Buy and bought him a set of Harmon-Kardon computer speakers, and installed them on his computer. At the same time, I got him more computer memory, and installed that as well.
Then I discovered what parents down through the centuries have always known: the gift of gratitude from people to whom you have showed generosity. Dick was like a kid again. He couldn’t believe how much better his transcriptions sounded and proudly played all of them just to discover them, yet again, with proper acoustics. The memory meant that he could get into his music program much quicker, and do more work.
He asked me, “Do you want to have my music and my computer when the time comes?” I told him, “Don’t say that; I’d be happy to have them but I don’t want them anytime soon.” But now the time has come, and I’ll happily take his last, generous gift, with thanks.
He used to potter around, starting one transcription and then moving on to another, chopping and changing until he finished one, then the next. I’d like to play you one of his transcriptions; it’s quite short.
Those of you who are familiar with this piece will note that Dick left the transcription unfinished. Like his life, it ends abruptly but not harshly. He had that often-asked-for but not as often given gift of a happy death, perhaps as a return on the generosity he’d shown to everyone during his life. May he rest in peace, and rise in glory.
Note that I have corrected one slight error in data since I gave this eulogy.
Louis Richard Child was born on February 3, 1929, in Lynn, the son of Harold and Jennie Child. He was thus a Depression baby.
Many of you may either be Depression babies, or be the children of Depression babies. People born at that time often grew up in deprivation. One thing they all learned, however, was to be frugal and generous when times were tough, and to be frugal and generous when times were good. It was all they knew.
Dick was both frugal, and generous, starting out with his military service, at the end of the Second World War. He didn’t serve in the Navy Seabees, as his brother did, or in the Navy, as my father did. He served in the Coast Guard, helping to keep our coasts free from dangerous ships and cargoes. He was, like his mother’s father before him, a sea cook.
It cut him to the quick one day when he burned an oven-full of pans of biscuits so badly that he had to tip the entire mess into the sea; they couldn’t be cleaned. It offended his frugal nature. He learned how to cook the hard way, in the military, and was (if he did say so himself) a good one. His men were always well-fed.
After the war, when he was demobilized, he attended Boston University, where he studied music, with an emphasis on the organ and piano. He got his degree in 1953, but hedged his bets. Instead of trying to make a living as a musician, he combined playing organ at St. Paul’s in Hamilton with a career as an accountant.
He was an avid golfer; his apartment is full of trophies, golf memorabilia, and books. He also loved to fish, hunt, and play poker, and had that cliché‘d quality: a good sense of humour. On top of everything else, he painted in oils. He was what the English call a “clubbable” man. He had many friends, and everyone I know who met him liked him right away.
My first memories of him are all around Christmas. Dick was the benevolent uncle who gave us each a crisp fifty-dollar bill in those cards with a pocket for a bill that showed you exactly which President or Revolutionary War hero you merited. Washington, Lincoln, Hamilton were the usual faces you saw in those cards in my family, as times were tough. But when we got our cards from Dick, we learned what Ulysses S. Grant looked like. We were quite fond of Grant.
In the early 1960’s I was fascinated with buildings, and wanted a certain construction set that I could use to build replicas of skyscrapers and the like. They were quite expensive, but I pestered my mother to get one anyway. When Christmas morning came, I got a smaller construction set from my parents, but it wasn’t the one I wanted. I pouted, as kids will do, and went to our grandparents’ place for Christmas dinner. Dick lived with his parents.
I’m sure my attitude hurt my mother, but she hid it. In Hamilton, before Christmas dinner, we were allowed to open our presents. Sober things like clothing, socks, mittens, all came from our grandparents. But a big box, with my name on it, came from Dick, and it was the construction set I wanted. There had been a conspiracy of parents with uncle, I think. Frugal, but generous. I still say a silent “sorry” to my mother’s spirit every time I think of that horrid but finally glorious Christmas.
When I was young, people always pointed out that I looked very much like Dick. Taking my entrance exam to St. John’s Prep, the school secretary, who was a friend of our family’s, was proctoring the exam and greeted my mother when she came in. Mom asked Miss Larkin whether she could pick me out of the crowd of kids who were in the room, and she pointed directly at me, saying “He looks just like your brother.” As it happens, growing older has meant that I look more like my father, and my own brother, but I hope that a little bit of the understated twinkle in my uncle’s eye has made it through the aging process.
As time went on my own life took a turn away from Massachusetts and I lost regular contact with Dick. But, each year at Christmas that generous envelope came, and we got together when we could. He lived in Ipswich, and in various places in New Hampshire, but at the last he decided to come and live with my brother, in Marblehead. He was near his family, he had his own little apartment under the main house, nice and light and airy, and he could sit at his computer and transcribe music all day, if he wanted. He said that it kept his mind active, and it seems to have worked, as he was as sharp at age 79 as he had been years before. And, I could see him, and have a little 4pm libation with him, whenever I visited.
I would give him computer advice, and he proudly showed me the compositions he had transcribed. But his computer was slow, and he thought that something was wrong with it, because the sound wasn’t quite right.
Last Christmas I finally had the chance to pay him back for all the gifts he had so generously given me and the rest of my family over the decades. I went to Best Buy and bought him a set of Harmon-Kardon computer speakers, and installed them on his computer. At the same time, I got him more computer memory, and installed that as well.
Then I discovered what parents down through the centuries have always known: the gift of gratitude from people to whom you have showed generosity. Dick was like a kid again. He couldn’t believe how much better his transcriptions sounded and proudly played all of them just to discover them, yet again, with proper acoustics. The memory meant that he could get into his music program much quicker, and do more work.
He asked me, “Do you want to have my music and my computer when the time comes?” I told him, “Don’t say that; I’d be happy to have them but I don’t want them anytime soon.” But now the time has come, and I’ll happily take his last, generous gift, with thanks.
He used to potter around, starting one transcription and then moving on to another, chopping and changing until he finished one, then the next. I’d like to play you one of his transcriptions; it’s quite short.
Those of you who are familiar with this piece will note that Dick left the transcription unfinished. Like his life, it ends abruptly but not harshly. He had that often-asked-for but not as often given gift of a happy death, perhaps as a return on the generosity he’d shown to everyone during his life. May he rest in peace, and rise in glory.
Note that I have corrected one slight error in data since I gave this eulogy.