Flat Rock as a Child

When I was a little girl,  my parents often took me to Flat Rock, a stretch of Fall Creek located between Sapsucker Woods and the Arboretum section of Cornell Plantations.  The rock there was smooth, hence the name, and most of the water was shallow.  As a toddler, I went wading, and, as an older child, practiced floating in the deeper, five-foot-level water.  There were several places where you could set your butt down and let the current of the creek carry you ten feet or so along the smooth rock.  The water was also fairly clean, since it was constantly moving.  I remember being supremely happy there.

Leap Year, Leap Day Letter

Dear Family and Friends:  I have decided to write a Leap Year letter, since I never got around to writing my yearly Christmas letter.

According to folklore, Leap Year Day is a day when a person should do something special, something you haven’t been able to get to yet, so get your thinking caps on, as they used to say to us in grade school.

Although I’m leaping into the future, my letter will mainly be about 2023.  However, the most important recent event occurred within the Leap Year in January 2024: the birth of my great niece, Florence Lynne Carter.  Her parents are my niece, Anna Mapes Carter, and her husband, Coleman Carter. Here are Florence and Anna:

I’ve known two Florences in my life: Florence Bonnell, my Grandfather Mapes’s girlfriend, who  buried two husbands and wore two diamonds rings, which really fascinated me as a little girl, and Florence Oakly, a woman from my parent’s generation, who lived next to my Clark grandparents in Lakewood, Ohio.  We’re headed back to the older names, folks, although I do happen to like this one.  I will never call her Flo, because that is the name of a woman I detest from the Progressive Insurance commercials.  Maybe Florie.  Anna had a much easier time than she did with Jude, their adorable two-year old.

Trip to Monticello, New York twice, once on way back from Philadelphia:  

In May, I made two trips, one where I solely visited Monticello and one where my main purpose was to see my friend, Denise, in Philadelphia.

During my first trip, I met up with my cousin, Brian Gager, who took me to lunch and showed me the Methodist church, where I saw my father’s first cousin, Nuni, get married the second time,

and the house where my Great-grandparents Scheuren lived, and where Brian and his wife have offices.  Brian serves as a caretaker for the church.

I also visited part of the farm that the state took over in 1959, where the Mapes homestead had existed.  The state road crew uses it now and there is a big pile of old road signs, proving you can’t go home again:

My second road trip was focussed on meeting up with my friend, Denise Haughian, in Philadelphia.

On the way down, I stopped in Scranton, Pennsylvania and visited the Lackawanna Coal Mine.  The Scheurens were a mining family from Germany.  Their tragedy was losing the paterfamilias, Michael, and son, Big Tom, who was at least 6’7” like my brother, to a mining accident.  My trip down into the mine was claustrophobic and I kept wondering how Big Tom had maneuvered in such cramped spaces.

I love driving, but I had a terrible time getting down to Denise.  In Pennsylvania, there are many right-hand exits, but few overpasses if you make a mistake.   

               

Denise and Ben 

My main memory of that day in Philadelphia was walking, walking, walking, great architecture, and Denise’s gift for the day: dinner at The Fork, one of the best meals I’ve had in a long time.

Raspberry Daiquiri

On the way back I stopped in Monticello a second time and visited the remaining ten acres of Mapes farmland that is directly across the street from the old road signs and state vehicles.  Half of our property was taken slice by slice in the late fifties, but this slice remains.  It is probably the only land left that looks anything like it did originally.    I guess you can sometimes go back home.  I am sentimental, so I love the fact that the 150-year-old black cherry tree below was a tree that was around during my grandfather’s time many years ago.

Apple Tree in Bloom on what’s left of pasture.

Because I couldn’t afford to go to Minnesota this summer, I made myself a tour of waterfalls in the Finger Lakes, leaving out Ithaca’s waterfalls on purpose.  The most spectacular set of waterfalls on one of my day trips were those in Letchworth Park, a park that had been written up in the New York Times just prior to my trip as the top state park in the country.  It is located between Canandaigua and Rochester, at least it was the way I drove there.  Here is a picture of the Upper Falls: 

Everyone always asks about Mom.  She is fairly healthy for her age (almost 98), but has unfortunately developed macular degeneration.  Reading has been her lifeline in recent years.  She does still read The NY Times and faithfully contributes to her favorite Democratic candidates.  This summer she received a big Cornell Alumni award for her service to Cornell.  It was her 70th reunion.  It was announced twice and the second time everyone present in Bailey Hall sang to her and she waved to them from the top row like a queen.

Happy Leap Year and Leap Day to everyone!  Be sure to do something special on the 29th.

                                                       Love, Kathy

P.S. My best read of 2023 was Demon Copperhead, by Barbara Kingsolver. It is loosely based on David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens, a favorite novel of mine.

Pete’s Tire Closing

This article was originally published in the Tompkins Independent, December 6, 2023

Dave deBruyn, Ernie Quarella, Ron Quarella, Vicki deBruyn

Brother and sister, Dave and Vicki deBruyn, co-owners of Pete’s Tire and Auto Service, on 432 Bone Plain Road, Freeville, New York, are closing their business at the end of December.  This is a hard pill to swallow for the many customers they have helped over the years.  They have been helping me nurse along my Toyota Corolla with its 96,000 plus miles for several years now, and I have been a customer of theirs since 2008.  My father, Barth E. Mapes, became a steady customer when he and my mother bought the Payne farm on Scofield Road back in the eighties for their retirement.  I found out that the business was coming to an end when I brought my car in for a new water pump and a switch to my winter tires, and found my regular tires in the back seat.

Their father, Pieter deBruyn, began the business in 1972, on the forty-two acres where he also had his home.  After the war, in 1949, he emigrated to the U.S. from Holland.  He was born in Alblasserdam in 1926, a city near Rotterdam, which was leveled during the war.  Because Europe was so ravaged, he thought it made sense to emigrate, but the rest of his family didn’t make the same decision. His mother died soon after.  Over the years, his American family became accustomed to listening to him talk on his phone to his family in the Netherlands in Dutch.

For years, Pieter worked for Agway on their farm tire service.  When Agway decided to quit that aspect of their operation, he decided to take it and his customers with him and formed a new business, named after him.  At its onset the business was 100 % geared toward farming, but over the years Pete’s Tire shifted its emphasis to the automotive side of things.  They now devote about 20 % of their business toward helping farmers.

The forty-two acres contained the business, the house, and a small dairy farm, where all of the deBruyn children worked as teenagers, including their older brother, Rodney, who still lives in the area.  The family kept 15 or 16 dairy cows at a time and sold their milk to Purity Ice Cream. Dave learned the agri business from his father, and Vicky and Dave both started working at Pete’s Tire in 1979.  They became co-owners in 1991 and Pieter died in 2001.

Their mechanics, brothers Ernie and Ron Quarella, have been with them over thirty-five years.

Dave says that a big part of what you look for in a mechanic is  “people who want to stay with it.”  The brothers have helped to serve as the backbone of the operation.  One of their mechanics has started to have back trouble, but both Vicki and Dave feel they are also ready to move on.

When I asked them how the area had changed since the business first started, Vicki said that the area had become more “gentrified,” while Dave commented that “the service industry is bigger, the farms are smaller, and there are fewer of them.”  Both of them commented on the increase in traffic in the area, except during the pandemic when Pete’s Tire stayed open.  What they say isn’t surprising, since Tompkins County is the only county growing in the Southern Tier, and much of the growth is taking place in Lansing, partly because of Cornell.

My memories of Pete’s Tire and the deBruyns and Quarellas include walking in the front door, where my eyes would always fall on the big cow, painted by Vicki’s daughters, Rachel and Katy, and some of their friends.  There was also a big wooden shoe on the back wall.  I understand the reason for that now.  I would be greeted by either Dave or Vicki.  If I was greeted by Vicki, I would first check to see what earrings she had on–she has many.  Whoever was handling me, would then go over the list of things I needed covered for that appointment and I would usually sit and read a book.  Vicki considered herself  “a Jill of all trades,” while Dave could be considered “a Jack of all trades.”  He often dealt more with the ordering of parts than Vicki. I asked them their secret to working together; they both said “trust and a strong work ethic, and “knowing each other’s limits.” My main memory of Ernie is that he liked my mother and came over to Kendal one Saturday and worked on her car.  She, in turn, made him cookies.

When I asked them what they would miss most in retirement, they both said the customer interaction and their co-workers.  Their children, who are scattered across the United States, aren’t interested in taking over the business, but they have provided many travel opportunities for their parents, including visits to Louisiana and Colorado.  Two of Dave’s hobbies include flying both personal planes and remote control planes.  He also likes to visit museums.  Vicki is into gardening and has various projects she wants to work on in her house.  But we, their customers, will definitely miss them.

My Uncle Chris Clark

My Uncle Chris Clark was born on October 13, 1940, so, not surprisingly, when Columbus Day rolls around I always think of him. He died on July 21, 2004 at age 63 of melanoma, having only been diagnosed a month before. Ours was a relationship that was most significant when I was a child, up into the time of my young adulthood. I had always thought we would reconnect in some major way when I was older, but that was not to be. The fact that I had a special connection with him in the past was obvious in 2000 when I received my PhD and he started sending me letters with “Dr. Kathryn Mapes” on them. He was obviously tickled just as my parents and my friend, Scott Hanson, were. “You’re the first person in our family to get a doctorate,” he said.

Here we are in front of my grandparents’ house at 1256 Arlington Road,
Lakewood, Ohio at probably the only point in my life when I was a blonde.
He was in junior high at that point.

I did have the advantage of not having much competition. My brother hadn’t been born yet, nor had my cousin, Carol. I was also the child of his favorite sister. And he hadn’t fostered or procreated. It was just me.

I have detailed our closest time together when he taught me to swim at the Lakewood Pool in Lakewood Ohio in my blog post, “The Whales in the Pool.” Unfortunately, no pictures were taken. He was amusing, self-confident, and full of brio. I was awarded salt water taffy when I performed well, and sometimes when I didn’t. When he was told he was terminal, he ascribed the melanoma to the deep, dark tans he acquired as a lifeguard there.

As a preteen, I was a junior bridesmaid along with Debbie McKendry, the sister of Amy McKendry, to whom my Uncle Chris was getting married. It was a very exciting occasion with trumpets at the beginning of the church service heralding the coming vows. He took off in a snazzy (a word he would have used) white Mustang with Amy after the wedding.

As an older teenager, I slept in his old room at my grandparents’ house with a small figurine of Rodin’s “The Thinker” and green wallpaper with a jungle pattern on the walls. I always try to figure out the personalities of people by their bedrooms. His room gave me few clues. I figured the statuette might easily have been a gift from his parents. On the wall next to the bed, however, was a picture of him in an Air Force uniform, climbing into a plane. Sadly, this was not to be his fate, which I knew at the time. He had wanted to be a pilot, but those pretty, blue eyes that made him so handsome turned out to be color blind. He did regale the family with the time he “lived off the land” when he was training in the Air Force, and actually ate a snake. During the first part of his marriage, instead of going to Vietnam, as was the case with many his age, he served as a member of the Honor Guard in Washington, D.C., burying the men who came back in coffins from Vietnam at Arlington Cemetery. He identified with the lead character in Garden of Stone, who performed the same duty, a movie starring James Caan.

Not long after that period, I attended Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio, which is an hour to the west of Columbus where Chris and Amy lived with their sons, Frank and David, in a leafy, upper class suburb called Worthington, Ohio. I don’t know exactly what they thought of me when I visited during this period. I was an emotional Republican with strong libertarian views and a sex life. In my guest room upstairs, which was actually the room of my foster cousin, David, I would smoke Marlboros, and put the ash out in juice glasses Amy gave me, probably afraid I would burn the house down. Both she and Chris had been smokers, but she didn’t want to embarrass me by telling me I wasn’t inhaling. David didn’t seem to mind me using his room, and would come visit me. He was fascinated with my clothes, and enjoyed himself one day by trying on my dressy white sandals.

Chris disappointed me sometimes by getting involved in long carpentry projects on the weekends, so during the day I spent most of my time with Amy, who was chatty and liked to eat popcorn in the early evening. Late at night, Chris was more exciting and loved to dish about the family and our various peccadilloes.

Our last big adventure took place on Crane Island in Lake Minnetonka, which I have detailed in my blog post, “July 1977-November 1979.” I came to Minnesota to visit their new summer cottage and ended up staying for thirty years (not in their cottage). When they divorced, I saw Chris far less because he no longer came to the cottage. However, he was always a lake lover and a lover of swimming. My favorite visit in the later part of our lives together was his visit to our cottage in Bob’s Lake, Ontario where he went swimming in the lake and my nieces washed his hair.

The Falls of Montour Falls

I think this will be my last trip of the season to view falls in the Finger Lakes area. I literally started out in Seneca country when I visited Letchworth Park and ended up back there a week ago. In between Seneca visits I covered Cayuga and Onondaga territory.

These pictures were taken in and around the City of Montour Falls in Schuyler County. I’d only been there once previously to see an orthopedic surgeon, Joseph Mannino, about the arthritis in my knees. For most of his life he was an Ithaca doctor, and now, alas, has retired. But I’m straying from my subject.

Iroquois Six Nations Map by R.A. Nonenmacher

She-Qua-Ga Falls (tumbling waters)

She-Qua-Ga Falls, the falls that is located in town, is 156 feet tall, and is an example of a cascade waterfall. The City of Montour Falls and Letchworth Park are roughly 80 miles apart, not surprising when one considers that the Senecas were the most powerful tribe of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. The Western New York Waterfall Survey mentions a Seneca warrior who trained his voice by bellowing over the sound of the falls.

Unfortunately, the waterfalls often serve as sirens to the young. If you go from the top of the falls in the photo to the bottom of the photo and the pool of water beneath the falls, you can get an idea of why. Falling off the cliff or jumping off the cliff would be dangerous. The water here is very shallow, as is true for many of the waterfalls in New York. In addition, when a waterfall has a lot of water, a whirlpool tends to form underneath it and swimmers will often find themselves caught up and unable to get out. We have had a number of deaths near the waterfalls in Ithaca and just outside in Buttermilk, Treman, and Taughannock Parks; some are suicides, but some are just caused by falling rock or simply not understanding how to navigate such unusual geological formations and the water that spills over them.

Right outside of Montour Falls is Havana Glen Park, home of Eagle Cliff Falls. The trail follows McClure Creek and is quite easy, except for two tiers of metal stairs that left me unnerved. I took one step at a time and held the railing tightly. A small waterfall spilled over low rocks at the very beginning.

Eagle Cliff Falls

All of the people there were adults, people from their thirties into their seventies, playing under the waterfall and skipping from rock to rock in a way one would not be able to do after a snow melt or a heavy rain. The only potential danger was falling shale, but everyone was ignoring that possibility.

Tinker Falls and Fall Driving

It was one those halcyon fall days in the Finger Lakes Region, or, as Mr. Rogers would say, “It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.” I especially enjoyed the drive from Cortland, northeast to Truxton, near where Tinker Falls is located. The corn was high on the farms at either side of the highway and the golden rod and purple asters alternated in Easter hues in successive patches that bordered the corn.

These are pictures I went back and took, when I realized I didn’t have illustrations for the words. I took pictures of Twin Oaks Farm in Cortland County because they have a side business and more space on the shoulder. You can also get an idea of the elevation.

As I drove, I went from Tompkins County where I live, to Cortland County, and then on to Onondaga (name of one of the Haudenosaunee tribes and name of one of the Finger Lakes) County. All three counties are part of the Finger Lakes region, 40 % of which is farmland. Cortland County ranges in terms of good and not-so-good soil; the variation has to do with where and how the glacier went through the area, but the most beautiful farms I drove through were there, probably because I was in the northern part of the county.

Onondaga County, where my Uncle Jack and Aunt Alice Mapes had their farm in Pompey Center, is 2/3 farmland. However, as my Uncle Jack discovered later in life, even with good soil, it’s harder to be a small-time farmer now. I thought about going back there, but my brother Barth says the barn has collapsed. I’m not surprised because my cousin told me that one of the tenant farmers cut a hole in the roof, so he could put the hay in the barn the easy way. Toward the end of his working life, my uncle was renting their land out to tenant farmers and working for Tommy down the road.

As I motored along, I thought of my grandmother on the Mapes farm in the Catskills who often had to expand her dinners for unexpected arrivals. “I’ll have to put another potato on,” she’d say. I wondered whether I would have been a good farmer’s wife. I would certainly have had to work on my cooking, although I did often peel and cut potatoes for our supper growing up, and place them on the burner on medium high, so I could certainly have dealt with potatoes.

It’s not surprising that I had trouble finding Tinker Falls in Labrador Hollow when you see the following picture:

I had to laugh when I saw this selfie in front of the falls. You can see my Botox was a little off the last time I was injected. Ah, vanity!

These are all pictures I took walking to the falls. You can see how little water is running through the creek bed. This region of the country is in what we call a “normal” drought; in other words, we don’t have a lot of extra water, but everything else looks great.

Tinker Falls

I was a little disappointed because it didn’t look like the picture online. It reminds me of a trip Lyndon Johnson took to the Twin Cities, where he was taken to see Minnehaha Falls, and remarked that it looked like someone was pissing over the ledge. This experience was pretty similar, except for the fact that it looked like three people pissing. In fact, I guess you could say that Tinker Falls was “tinkling” over the ledge.

The Road Not Taken

I was really tempted by this road, and may go back. From what I read ahead of time I think it’s quite a long trail and I always like to be able to see other people when I’m walking. I’m a little long in the tooth to attract a serial murderer, but there are many creepy people out there. This path in Labrador Hollow looked inviting and mysterious to me.

New Tibetan Learning Center in Town

Ithaca has a new Tibetan Learning Center up on South Hill.  The Dalai Lama, who now lives in India, was not present, although he has been here before.  This Namgyal Monastery is one of five in the world.  In the past, the monks were located in a rented space several houses down from St. Paul’s Methodist Church, the church I attend.  The statue is of the Dalai Lama.  I realize this is not the greatest shot, but I didn’t want to get in the way.

The picture on the right is one I took of Tashi, one of Mom’s nurses, and his daughter, Chime. I’m convinced that one of the reasons Mom is still alive is because she sets goals for herself and tries to stay abreast of new things as they are happening. Tashi’s father was very involved with the construction of the library.

This is Tashi with his son and nephew. The one in the blue shirt is his son who was trying to hide from me. Hie nephew is in the yellow shirt. Tashi has been very loyal to my mother, so much so that she sent out thirty invitations to the opening. I’ve been more impressed with the nursing in assisted living than I am with the nursing in the skilled nursing section. It’s too complicated to explain here, but Kendal charges two times the rent for skilled nursing than it does for nursing in assisted living where Tashi works. My brother and I think the nursing in assisted living is superior.

Inside of Library

This is a video of the dancing that took up most of the two hours we were there.

A young boy named Dawa entertained by first fanning us, then having me fan him, and then playing peek-a-boo,

Exterior of Tibetan Learning Center (Mom in blue)

The Zhengs and One Mapes Do Wells

Andreanna Zheng presented a psychology poster in the library at Wells College today. She is receiving a B.A. in English and a B.S. in Psychology.

She scanned in to “enter” the conference. “The times they are a changin.”

The title of her presentation

Summary of her Senior Thesis. It sounds a lot like Literary Criticism.

Psych Prof and Andreanna

Andreanna and Meghan, her favorite English teacher

Ms. Pleasant Rowland, the original owner of the American Girl Company, attended Wells College, a college that originally was a women’s college, but now accepts men. In 2001, she began to buy and remodel some of the commercial properties that the college owned, in addition to purchasing others, including the furniture company, MacKenzie Childs, and Fargo Bar and Grill. Some of the locals were not too happy, but she definitely enhanced the look of the town.

Although my family always went to Aurora Inn, we chose a less pricey option across the street, Fargo Bar and Grill. Upon entering, we were helped with the elevator by the manager. I asked if Ms. Rowland owned the bar and he said “Yes, but the locals seemed to like it here.” He’s probably been asked quite a few times.

Here we are celebrating:

Andreanna

Andrea

Me

Fillmore Glen State Park Redux

Walking is my favorite form of exercise, with swimming being second, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that I returned to Moravia to hike the South Rim Trail, which is 1.25 miles long, and to hike back on the Gorge Trail, which is 1.31 miles long, whereas before I had simply driven the South Rim Road and walked short distances. I took the South Rim Trail going southeast and the Gorge Trail going northwest.

I stopped first at the replica of the cabin Millard Fillmore was born in. You can get an idea of why he wanted to leave Moravia.

Getting older isn’t much fun in the physical sense, especially with my left foot growing increasingly numb, but I am determined to walk the rest of my life. Franklin Roosevelt started the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corp) in 1933 to give employment to men between eighteen and twenty-five during the Depression. They worked on national and state parks, building trails that are familiar to anyone who has done a lot of hiking and camping. Some of the steps were built entirely of stone, some of earth and stone , and some of earth and wood. We have an extensive park system in New York and I grew up climbing up and down the trails, so you would think I would be used to them, but I have to be very careful now that I place my feet flat on the ground and stay away from the cliff edges.

This picture gives you an idea of the drop off along the South Rim Trail:

When I was halfway down a steep hill, I realized I was going to fall but managed to fall backwards on my butt. I decided I was safer going to the bottom via my butt. This isn’t always a good idea, as I once discovered when I was taking a beaver dam apart and found I couldn’t get to it without treading on some loose gravel. Later, I came down with poison ivy on my posterior that had to be treated with steroids. However, going downhill is definitely harder than going uphill, as my brother discovered when hiking part of the Appalachian Trail. Our Mapes knees are simply not made for downhill walking.

This is what I would call a “weeping” wall on the right with a man-made wall on the left. The right wall is a good example of Devonian rock. It is not particularly stable. At Taughannock Park in Ithaca, they have a yearly practice of knocking off any loose shale.

The following are pictures of Dalibarda Falls:

When I was a little girl and I lived in an apartment on North Sunset Drive in Ithaca, New York, I would take walks in the woods that started at the end of our back lawn, always starting with the felled log that had orange fungi on it. Then I would walk alone along the path, until I reached the end where I could see Cayuga Lake in the distance.

I’ve always liked walking alone, but when I was a little girl imagining being a bigger one, I didn’t think I would always walk alone. Neither of my girlfriends in Ithaca and I are in the habit of taking walks together. I also am not a good candidate for group walks because I would slow everyone down. On the occasion of the celebration of my mother’s 90th birthday, our family and Hans Olsen and his wife Ulla Theil climbed Gurten Hill outside of Bern, Switzerland. Hans took the cable car up the hill with my mother, while Ulla stayed behind and walked at my pace. I think she was the only person who realized how far behind I was.

During my walk through Fillmore Glen, I saw many families with young children, and a number of couples in their fifties, I only saw two couples my age: one couple had two walking sticks each and the woman in the other couple wasn’t capable of walking very far. That doesn’t say very much for my generation, the baby boomers. Although I enjoyed the walk, I did feel lonely whenever I passed other people.

In Memory of Philip Ives, who died September 21, 1962

A question placed on Facebook by the Cornell Alumni Association about the Cornell University swim test brought back memories of a group of young men in ties and suits politely eating finger sandwiches and other treats in our living room in September of 1962. The program they were entering was an experimental two-year program for young guys from family farms who were planning on continuing in the profession. My grandfather, John Mapes, had taken what was called the Short Course for young farmers back in the twenties, a program that ran for three winters, so this was not a new idea. My father, Barth Mapes, who had grown up on my grandparents’ dairy farm in the Catskills, was helping to administer the new program. Among the students was a young man named Philip Ives who looked demure in his suit and his blonde brush cut, a haircut that was still prominent at that time, as was the suit. No student of that early part of the sixties generation would have dreamed of showing up in jeans.

Philip was to die only days later while taking the Cornell swim test. This is a test that has been required at many universities, and is still required at Cornell. A number of respondents to the question on Facebook referred to the practicality of requiring a swim test at a school located near so much water, including Cayuga Lake and the various natural pools of water in gorges and near waterfalls. Others joked about the male nudity often required. I knew that male professors swam nude at Teagle Hall, but didn’t know this practice applied to male students. Somehow I ended up on Quora where the practice of men and women swimming nude at other universities and during earlier times was an interesting and surprising subject, but I couldn’t remove myself from what I knew about the young boy/man who raised his hand in the pool at Teagle and sank.

In The Sidney Record And Bainbridge News, the writer gives us a brief description of the events that transpired at Teagle: “He was one of six students being watched by three instructors and one of the instructors immediately brought him out of the pool. Artificial respiration was applied 45 minutes without success. The coroner’s verdict was accidental drowning.” Too many students in the pool at once? It doesn’t sound like there was negligence, however.

Lucrezia Herman alerted me to the Cornell Sun article, “Student Dies in Pool During Swim Test,” dated September 24, 1962, three days after he died. Surprisingly, he did know how to swim: “Ives had already swum the length of the 25-yard pool and was about one-third of the way through his second lap when he suddenly threw up his right arm and sunk to the bottom.” The coroner, Dr. Low, offered the explanation that “the heart can stop ‘within a minute.’ He explained that since evidence of cardiac arrest cannot be detected after death, he has to consider the surrounding circumstances.” He went on to say that taking into account the water in Phillip’s lungs, it was reasonable to look at his death as being due to drowning.

Research on Ancestry.com tells me that Philip was born in 1944, which makes him a war baby. His father’s name was Marvin; his mother’s was Grace. He was buried at Greenlawn Cemetery in Bainbridge, New York, Chemung County. My father was not at the cemetery. Cornell did not let him go. He didn’t have much choice since he didn’t have a tenured position.

My father couldn’t memorialize Philip Ives the way he would have liked, so maybe I can do this in a minor way by remembering him in this post, the eighteen-year-old who ate at our house and died during a swim test not so long after. At the end of the article, his three brothers are mentioned, all of whom graduated from Cornell in the College of Agriculture. Alas, that was not to be for Philip.