Notre Dame Alumnus, Vol. 30, No. 02 -- March-April 1952 - Archives ...

cntly receiving much praise for his new bofik
"The Devil Vou Say *'
"And in limited activity in the Knights of
Columbus, I have had contact with John Rocap,
' class of 1930, who is now a member of the Supreme
Board of the K. of C, . . . also, Tom
Nfcdland, class of 1930. State Secrrtary of the
K. of C., and likely successor to Bill Zahn of
our town as Indiana State Deputy.
''Joe Dillon, class of 1930, still maintains his
home in Huntington, but is working at the International
Harvester in Fort Wayne and going well.
"Had a casual meeting not long ago with
Bob Eggcman, class of 1930, in Fort Wayne. And
a few minutes later with Frank Coxbctt, of our
doss. Both looked well, although I had no opportunity
to visit with them. Also saw Norb
Bei^iofr, class of 1929, when Helen and I went
to pay our respects on the occasion of the death
of his Mothcr-in-Law. Mrs. Laura Noll Collins.
**That about does it, Deverc. And, as I said
in the beginning of thi* now and then we se:; John Colemaii.
*33, or Harold McCue, '33, at a Sunday Mass in
Towanda, or lawyer Jim CuUen, '28, of nearby
Sa>Te at the county court house in Towanda. Jim
is quite active in Democratic Party affairs, but
this is an overwhelmingly Republican county,
which situadon has militated against Jim becoming
the excellent public servant he potenttaUy
is. (That seems to be one of the weak points of
our two-party system.)
"Just in case I've made the raising of nine
kids sound too simple in the earlier part of this
letter, let me say now that ive've had our difficulties.
Our major adventures in medicine and
surgery have been miraculously few: two unqile
fractures of forearms; three fractured %'ertdirae
(all in one victim at one time) which healed
perfectly, one appendectomy, one concussion, surgical
repair of a congenital cleft lip, a near-fatal
case of whooping cough ui a nine-week-old baby,
and one tonsillectomy complete the list. Sure,
we've had scratches, mumps, cuts, bums, measles,
sprains, whooping-coughs, bruises, chicken pox,
colds, and what-have-you galore, but none of
these ever reached serious proportions. Sometimes
I think these nine of ours were each ^ven a
sfoaaX gift ol t%n» or three gnardiaB anfds inttead
of the imttimmf aOotaent of oae ipiiri
"Hcwever, the sane God Who sent « ••ch
heahhy . chndrcn and hcpc their aMthcr the
healthiest of all the faailr s»r fit, in ICi Infinite
Wisdom, to take away^ soine two yean a^a
what had always prevkmslr been mif encdlent
health. After that, with devea nnaths to feed
and dor resources xtfSdSj dwnadfiag, U waa not
long before I - learned what a strong unniHtinn'
despair can be. But then, just when- things wereloohittg
their darkest, along canse -Ae fourtemth
Sunday after Pentecost with its Gospd fauB the
Sermoo on the Mount, inchiding ''Consider the
birds of the ain they neither sow nor reap, nor
do they gather into bams; yet your Itfawnly
Father f eedeth then. Arc not you ol nndi
greater value than they?" . After that Aings
didn't look cfiute as hopeless as they had previously
and DOW, two years lata*, althoo^ I am
still unable to cam a Hvii^ («• myself or for
those in my charge, here we are all together as
one family, all alive, -all esccept myself cputt well,
and all ha^ipy. With profound gratitude and with
the deepest revrrence, I can say that in tibe tine
of our great need, in Hn own way and through
agents of His own dKxuing, our heavenly Father
has fed us and much more than merely fed us.
"It wasn't exactly easy, Devere, to write that
last paragraph, for it certainly, is no story of
finandbd success or material accomplishment sodi '
as I am accustomed to reading in our class n ws,
yet the story of this family would not be complete
without that paragraph. I debated with
myself for a long time before inclmfing it; I
finally decided in favor of its inclnsioQ with the
hope that it might be read by sameoniie fubo h
finding the goiag much tougher than he would
like and that posnbly he might be inqinrcd to
keep going a little longer, and then a little longer
again, as we had to learn to do. That's a v ry
bard lesson to leam, but we know it can' be
learned.
"With kindest personal regards to yourself and
to all at Notre Dame."
From Morristown, Tennessee, a gentleman who
specializes in the art