This thread is to memorialize the best things about your father, if you so wish.

For my Dad - RRR (these were his initials)

I am most proud of my Father for being a pilot back in the early days of flying. He achieved the rank of Lieutenant Commander in the Navy during WWII. He flew the wounded back from the Pacific during this war. I met someone as an adult, who had also been in that war and told me my father had saved the lives of many men.

My father survived growing up in a family of seven children, as the youngest. He didn't become bitter, when he was mistreated by his older siblings.

While he really didn't know how to be a "Daddy", he worked faithfully to support his family. He also did teach me how to play golf, and I rewarded him by excelling at this game in my high school days.

He refused to send me to college after high school, but later encouraged me to go back to college, when I was 32, after my brother had died.

He loved my mother fiercely. He courted her by flying over her family's house. When the dishes shook in the cabinet, as Dad flew over, my grandmother said, "Don't go out with that boy -- he'll kill you." Well Mom didn't listen, and Dad persevered in his courtship of my mother, even after being thrown down the front steps of my mother's house by her father, and told not to come back. I also believe he willed himself to go first, because he couldn't stand the thought of being in this world without my beautiful mother.

I love and miss you Dad! I wish we could have had more good times together!!!

EJ