Update 5-28-13

Hi,

 

First, a mention of Memorial Day.  There's a sweet piece online about a woman whose high school boyfriend was killed in the south Pacific in 1944.  He'd created a diary for her, which took 70 years to reach her.  But she'd always kept his high school ring.

 

Next, the answer to last week's mystery.  The notes, and some my responses, in order.

 

From Philip Dorin:  I can certify that the boy who drowned in the creek definitely was not Dennis Faragher. Dennis was, indeed, what we might today call mentally challenged, but he went all the way through Forest Road School and South High School with my class, which graduated in 1966, and I'm 99.9% certain that he appears in my yearbook.  But I'm unable to verify that until I get back home.

 

From Helen David:  Until now, I had little to add to the story of the drowned boy.  He was in one of my junior high school science classes in the late 1950s.  At that time mentally challenged pupils were mainstreamed... or, at least, he was.

    Oddly enough, my first impression of him was that he was bright.  Perhaps it was because he had a look of rapt attention and seemed fascinated by the subject matter being discussed or demonstrated.  He smiled frequently.  

    He had no mustache at this tender age, but his eyebrows were black and extremely thick, hence someone's suggestion of Neanderthal.  He was stocky and had a somewhat mature look.   

    That is about all that I can remember about him more than a half-century since, but I can still visualize him in his seat in the classroom.  Living in the neighborhood, I would also see him around in later years.

 

From Emily Kleinman Schreiber:  No, the boy lived on the other side of the creek from Green Acres.  I may have more information for you, after I hear back from someone who lived near him.

 

[Rich -- From me to Philip, Helen, Emily, and Amy Kassak Bentley:  Not Joseph Dennis Faragher, Jr.  He would have been too old if he was born in 1937 and was still in Helen David's junior high science class in, say, 1958.  Unless he was frequently held back.  Nice theory though on my part.  Just totally wrong.]

 

The follow-up from Emily:  This will tell you what you want to know.  Eileen Duffy Traslavina and her family lived on the other side of the creek from Green Acres.

 

From Eileen Duffy Traslavina:  His name was Jimmy O'Neil, and I remember the incident like it was yesterday.  He lived about 3 houses down from my house, and he was a gentle soul who spent a lot of time talking to me.  I was only about 8-years-old when he died.  He liked to take walks around the creek in his peacoat and cap.  He disappeared during the winter and was missing for months.  In the early spring, some boys fishing in the creek snagged their line on his body, and it was found.  He was very afraid of dogs, and the theory was that some dogs chased him onto the icy creek in the winter, the ice broke, and he drowned. Strangely, they found his body near his house.  It did not wash downstream with the current.
    I remember being devastated by his death.  He was my first experience with a 'retarded' person, and it was so positive for me.  I grew up as a middle kid in a large Irish Catholic family, and there was little time to sit and listen to me.  Jimmy always had the time to sit on my step and talk and listen to me.  Fifty years later, I still mourn him.

And from Eileen's sister, Mary Frances Duffy:  I am Eileen's sister, and I also remember Jimmy O'Neil.  He was a wonderful, friendly soul, who wanted so badly to have friends.  This was before mentally challenged children were mainstreamed in schools.  I doubt if he ever went to school, which must have been hard for him, watching all the kids walk past his home on Jedwood Place and going to South High. 
    He disappeared one day, and no one knew that he had drowned until his body was pulled from the creek five months later in the spring. 
    He loved to talk.  He was full of life and sought out my sister and our three brothers when we lived there. Today, his life might have been different.  He may have gotten a job and lived in a group home.  But back then, he was marginalized and alone.

 

Again, from Helen David:  Yes, gentle soul is the way that I would describe Jimmy.  Was he able to complete South?  Perhaps Doris Navin's all-day class for the mentally and learning disabled was established by then.  Doris was an English teacher who began at South the year before me but went on an extended maternity leave, during which she may have taken certifying courses for the additional license.

 

[Rich, again, from me to Philip, Helen, Emily, and Amy, and to Eileen and Mary Frances -- I didn't have time before to do more than forward Emily's message from Eileen to the three people who'd been immediately following along.  But I did want to thank Emily again for following up and to thank Eileen and Mary Frances for taking the time to write her and us.  As I also mentioned to Amy, whether we knew the boy's name or not, in a way, we were keeping his memory alive.

    And it's interesting that I probably saw Jimmy and may have mixed him up with Dennis.  Dennis was what we now call mentally challenged, too, and he may have worn a dark pea coat like the one Eileen and I remember seeing Jimmy in.  They weren't uncommon.  But it could have been Jimmy walking to the shopping center who I saw, and I could have attached Dennis' name to him when I asked neighborhood people who he was, and they thought I meant the boy who lived nearby.  Or it could be that Jimmy and Dennis were both dark-haired, intense boys, because Helen David responded to my description of what I thought was Dennis with her memory of Jimmy.  So I may have seen both of them at different times and thought they were the same person.

    But as soon as Eileen mentioned that Jimmy had drowned in his backyard, I remembered that part of the story.  If I'd recalled it sooner, I would have known the boy couldn't have lived in Green Acres.  He did live along the section of the creek I'd always pictured, just on the other side.

    And, evidently, he had two close friends in Eileen and Mary Frances, who remember him fondly still today, so that's really nice.  And if he'd lived longer, his life might have been less limited than we think.  That was the period when things were beginning to change.  Speaking of which, May 27th is Bob Dylan's birthday.  He was just 72.

    Again, thanks to everyone and, particularly, to Amy, for being curious.]

 

Finally, from Amy:  What a blessing to be able to bring the memory of Jimmy, maybe especially because he died so young, back into the world and to the people who remember him.

 

The South '65 e-mail addresses: reunionclass65 . blogspot . com

 

The South '65 photo site: picasaweb . google . com / SouthHS65

 

 

Rich