November 20th 2009
Our school has a terrific tradition of reflecting on themes related to Thanksgiving during this assembly, and I am honored to continue that tradition today. Just as importantly, Mrs Devino and our talented students will send us off humming, and with our eyes and ears somehow a bit closer to vacation, if not a bit closer to heaven.
When I think about Thanksgiving I think about the double-helix of family and gratitude… . and those combined thoughts, especially this time of year, usually lead me to thinking about my grandfather. He was born in 1900, so I always knew how old he was. His parents named him Harry, and when his mom shook the President’s hand at a whistle stop tour shortly before he was born they chose his middle name – McKinley. His grandparents were first generation from Germany. They had been coal miners like their parents, and they came to the promised land called America and settled in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, because they could continue to be coal miners there, and because the land reminded them just enough of the place they left in Germany.
My grandfather was planning to be a coal miner because that’s what his family did since they could remember – they were big, hearty, hard working people who enjoyed life and were appreciative that they had jobs at all. He said that was just what you did in Pottsville, you worked in the mines, and he really did not think much of it either way.
That was his plan,that was his expectation, except for one thing – he had a passion for baseball, he loved the game and played it every spare moment he could. He was a modest man, and when he told me he was pretty good at, I just got the feeling that meant something.
He was playing for the Pottsville town baseball team late in his high school years, and a man named Mr. Clothier was in the stands, saw him play, found him after the game, and said if you go play baseball for my college, I’ll pay your way. My grandfather told me he wanted to say to the man “what is college” but he knew enough about the idea of college, and did not want to seem dumb to this man who was talking with him about college, so instead he said “what college?” and the man said a place called Swarthmore. Mr. Clothier said it was only 100 miles away, that he could get there in an afternoon train ride, and reiterated that he would pay the tuition if he went to Swarthmore and played baseball.
So my grandfather went home to talk to his parents about it. His parents had not heard of Swarthmore Pennsylvania, let alone Swarthmore College, but said if he should give it a try if he wanted to – the coal mines, they said, would always be there for him.
He went to college, he loved it, and it changed his life because it changed his horizons – it changed, in the language of one of our school values, where he was aiming with his life. No one in his family went to college before him – everyone in his family has gone to college since.
These scenes have played out time and time again in a black and white movie in my mind – in the movie, Mr. Clothier looks something like Mr. Holland, and my grandfather looks something like a teenage Mr. Hastings.
It turned out he loved chemistry at Swarthmore – he said it just fired him up – he found a job as a chief chemist for a company and when the great depression hit in 1929 he was the only one on his block who kept a job. He was devoted to his company – worked there his entire life. It was a time when companies returned the loyalty and, if you were fortunate enough, you would retire from the place where you started with a big party and a gold watch as a symbol of gratitude for the 30 or more years of work.
Again, I can play the story out like a movie – he had a chemistry teacher at Swarthmore who looks like Mr. Bradley, and the baseball coach looks like Doc Sanford, and his best friends – the ones he introduced me to at his retirement community – look like . . . well, you can fill it in from there.
My grandfather loved telling the story to me about the meaning of Mr. Clothier in his life, and I now know he also used the story to have me understand the incredible, time-traveling power of what it means to help someone else. He told me the story with greater detail as I got older – he never had an ounce of boasting about himself, rather he always spoke of his incredible good fortune, and wanted me to know that I had the ability to do the same thing as this man I never met, but whose name was on a huge department store in Philadelphia, called Strawbridge & Clothier – which, by the way, was bought by Macy’s in 1999 and, best I can tell, is no longer in existence.
And so I want to be bold enough, and clear enough, to have you do some specific thinking over Thanksgiving – I want you to be aware of two things, and each bit of awareness has a responsibility that comes with it.
First – there are Mr. Clothiers in our life in 2009, and I urge you to be aware of who they are. Thanksgiving is simply the perfect time to reflect on, and be grateful for, people who have helped us. Not every story needs to be dramatic, but if you are not aware of your Mr. Clothiers – those who offered inspiration, those who saw something in you and had faith in you, those who encouraged you to stretch and aim high - you won’t know how you have grown from their kindness, and you will miss out on how their encouragement keeps echoing in your life.
Why does knowing the Mr. Clothiers in your life matter? The answer connects to my second bit of homework.
Each of us has the ability to do for someone what Mr. Clothier did for my grandfather, and start that phenomenal, time traveling arc of opportunity for someone else. Again, it does not have to be dramatic – in some ways, the smallest gestures have the capacity to be the most meaningful . . . but you just never know. So I would ask you to find a way to help someone by recognizing a talent they have, and encouraging them to pursue it.
Harry McKinley Sellers left me his gold watch, and I know he wanted me to have it for the stories it could tell, and for whatever ability his grandchildren may have to inspire others to think about the way a kind act can travel across time . . . Have a terrific Thanksgiving.
