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Note: Was in Okinawa, 319th bombardment group (L) at Machinato Air Base in July-Sept. 1945 Calloway Arthur Massengill wrote to me saying: I'm sorry I didn't research far enough to place Claude Jr. I knew him as "Duby". He died about 2 days after Claude Sr. He was too ill to come from the state of Washington for his dad's funeral. I talked to my Uncle Barton, who would be your great uncle--I would be your 2nd cousin. My Dad would also be your great uncle. My Mother and Dad are both dead. They had a large family--14--twelve still living--2 boys died at birth. There are 7 girls and 5 boys living. I am the oldest boy (65) have 5 children, six grand children. I live on the property that John R. and Nancy occupied when he died. Nancy (grandmother) died with my Aunt Maggie, her daughter at Harian. My Unle Barton (died 1996) is the only uncle, (Claudes's brother still living. He lives here by himself. His wife died several years ago. They had twin girls, my age. Mary Lou, spent 30 years as missionary to Japan, lives in Knox, Tennesee. Betty is in Mich. married to a preacher. I could write a book on this family, but I don't have the time. You may want to come to the family reunion. Your Dad was my first cousin. Calloway Massengill. May 28, 1992. In Memory of Claude Massengill My father's life was filled with many roles and numerous phases, brilliant--if quiet--successes and bitter disappointments. He performed better in some roles than others. I am fairly certain, though we never discussed it, that if possible he would choose to repeat some periods of his life, while revising others. The people whose lives he touched, and those who touched his, helped shape and define him. In all these things, Dad was no different from anyone else. The uniqueness, the essence, of each of us is in the trivia, the fine brush strokes. My mind, like yours, is a storehouse of occasions with him experienced firsthand, and stories he told in bits and pieces many times over. These somehow paint a portrait of my father that I will carry the rest of my life. I'd like to try to describe that portrait. Born in Kentucky shortly before The Depression, he grew up during a time when material things didn't come easily. His parents expressed love by their industry and provision rather than with words. Hard work was balanced with hard play, and he grew up with a deep love of sports. He thrived on all kinds of competition and his boyhood idols were baseball players, especially those wearing Detroit Tiger uniforms. As older and a younger sister have different memories of identical times, but it is clear that their typical sibling competition and disdain were only exceeded by their mutual protectiveness and affection. It was predictable from my father's indifferent attitude about school, and consequent lack of accomplishment, that whatever occupation his future might hold, it would undoubtedly be well clear of anything academic. A sports career would have been more likely at that point. His athletic achievements with a team inexplicably known as the Dubies gave him his lifelong nickname. Before graduating--sigh of relief--from high school, he became a brother again. I'm not certain whether having a baby brother made him happy, jealous or bored. But in any event, the War soon took him away from home. Growing up, my sisters and I heard countless stories of his years in the Army Air Corps. Had more of those stories been closer to the front, I suppose we might never have been born to hear them. As it turned out, his tour of duty had the unlikely effect of making him, in turn, a student, a husband, a father, and a teacher. While on active duty, he spent much of his time in training and classes that gave him a great running start on a college degree. After the war, the GI Bill gave him the resources to continue college, where he was active in sports, journalism... and even his classes. He also met, courted, and married Alice Wolfe, who, judging from her yearbook pictures through the eyes of an adoring son, must have been the most beautiful woman on campus. Over the next 45 years, she would have four children with him, take on a quietly, indispensably supportive role as wife and mother, hear his jokes and puns in endless cycles, endure the affectionately disparaging names he called her--Wolfe, The Warden, The Boss--and repeat the exasperated, anticipated, "Duby" a minimum of 65,000 times. He was tarring a roof when I was born, but don't look to that anecdote as a foreshadowing of an absentee dad. I remember standing with him on the hospital lawn looking up to the window where Mom was holding my new sister. Although I was only three or four, he was a scoutmaster taking me along with his troop night fishing, a group of boys quite upset with the little twerp who had entertained himself by throwing rocks in the water. As I grew up, he taught me to play sports, coached some of my teams, took us on trips. He spent many hours teaching me, somehow intent on producing children with a better academic start than he had had. When he started teaching, he was an educational one-man-band: teacher, bus driver, custodian, coach. He was even a principal briefly before we moved to California. In 1953, we followed his mother and father in the westward migration. His sisters' families soon followed. Also soon following was the birth of twin daughters. A family of six on a teacher's salary. He worked hard. Daytimes in the classroom, early morning milk route, and summers taking more classes for a Masters Degree and administrative credentials. He soon became principal of a new elementary school. I remember our dinner table as a nightly recounting of the adventures and misadventures of students and teachers. He brought his athletic competitive drive to his performance at school, having a passion for excellence before that phrase was coined. It was tempered, however, with caring and compassion. Although his roots were in the South, though he had his share of blind spots, he modeled a social philosophy that would not tolerate intolerance of differences. Once, while mowing the front lawn, I was approached by a house-hunting couple who asked if there were any, you know, coloreds living in our neighborhood. I don't remember my shocked response to them. But I do recall going into the house and relating the incident to Dad. He shook his head and said I should have told them that my father was the only one I could think of. When Dad left Rialto, his school community gave him a bittersweet send-off, celebrating all he had given and mourning their loss. He con- tinued to hear from many of them over the last twenty-three years. Rialto's loss was Arcadia's gain and it is possible that that staid, conservative community wasn't quite prepared for him. Actually, the parents and most of the teachers fell in love with him, but the administration realized they had a tiger by the tail. He was twice recognized nationally for the quality of the school programs he administered, but was constantly at odds with the central office as he did battle with the status quo. When his health forced him to retire at 52, he struggled for many years with his self-esteem. So much of his identity was tied to his school role, a void had been left. He gradually seemed to become more accepting of living a day at a time, but his days as an educator weren't really over. For years he tutored and taught a granddaughter, giving her the individual time and patience that a school system and busy parents couldn't. It was as if his entire career was distilled in this single role as teacher/grandfather. The skills and the relationship he imparted will belong to Katie always, and would alone be sufficient reason to have lived. A few years ago, during a time when I was considering leaving education for a more lucrative type of work, I heard a song, "Leader of the Band". It was Dan Fogelberg's tribute to his father, in whose footsteps he was following. As I listened, I felt the weight of my father's life, the substance and the meaning of it. His premature retirement left him feeling his work wasn't complete. I felt by staying, I might somehow share in that meaning, help bring closure to his work, and honor him. All of us are riddled with failings, sins, shortcomings. My father was no exception. But I want to celebrate who he was and who he will always be to me. And I want to honor him for the countless number of lives he enriched as he passed through. Dad, we'll miss your company, your improvised, unconscious music, your horrible jokes. But you will always be a part of each of us." Claude retired at age 51 from his principalship at an elementary school in California, because of his health. He had two by-pass surgeries, and an angioplasty after that. He had a cardiac arrest 7 months before he died. He had 7 grandchildren, the oldest is 23 (in 1994), 20, 19, 18, 16, 4, and 8 mo. He wasn't physically able to travel because of his health. Information from Alice, his second wife.
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