The Leader of The Band

In his song Dan Fogelberg pays tribute to his father "The Leader of the Band".  Most of us have heard the song and probably know many of the lyrics but have given it little thought beyond that.  January 10th marks the loss to my family of the "Leader of the Band".  That was the day we lost my father.

He died of complications of a chest infection.  He suffered in later years from COPD.  A smoker for many years as well as many of the jobs he held over the years had damaged and weakened lungs.  Though you would never know it as he never let it slow him down.  However, my siblings and I know the real reason was that he had lost the will to live after the loss of my Mother in 2000.

My father was an interesting and complex man.  He was curious to a fault and had so many hobbies during his life it is hard to recount them all.  He was a talented teacher who even in retirement was constantly coming across former students (many well into their fifties) that still vividly remembered him.  He had a simple philosophy of life live it fully but hurt no one.

My mother and he were married for 56 years.  Family was extremely important to him.  Perhaps since his parents were divorced shortly after he was born and he spent much of his childhood with aunts and uncles.  My mothers large Italian family welcomed him and he fit right in.  They were married during the second World War when my father was stationed in Harlingen Texas and my mother was working at the base for the Army.  Oddly enough they met at a women's basketball game that my father was refereeing. 

My father was quite the athlete  Gymnastics, football, basketball, figure skating (on roller skates no less) even a stint as a professional skater with the Roller Derby.  He was involved in the early days of water skiing and began and ended his teaching career teaching PE and coaching.

In an ironic parallel with the Dan Fogelberg song my father tried another career that of a farmer.  To say he did not have a green thumb would be an understatement.  After a year of trying my grandfather who had helped him get started encouraged him to find another line of work.  After a brief stint in New York as a hardware clerk hew went back to school and finished his Bachelors Degree that had been interrupted by the war and then went to UNT in Denton to complete his Master's Degree.  He spent a large part of his teaching career in Corpus Christi.  Which was conveniently close to my mother's parents.  After their deaths he got itchy feet and me moved to California spending three years there before moving back to Texas and ending up in Uvalde.  He would complete his career there and return to Corpus Christi on retirement.  Uvalde was where I began my teaching career and my parents retirement and move coincided with my families move to Kaufman Texas where I would move into administration.  My brother and sister lived in Corpus.  That said I think you begin to understand the importance to my father of being close to family.

The ironic twist to my lead in to this wave of nostalgia is also ironic.  My father wanted badly to be able to sing and play an instrument.  Sadly this was one of the few things he never mastered.  As my mother would lament not only could my father not carry a tune in a bucket the bucket had holes in it.  Though he is responsible for my playing the guitar.  I was apparently the only of my siblings that had expressed any interest.  When I was in the third grade he bought me my first and bought one for him as well.  While I was not very good he persisted and I was given another when I was fifteen and given lessons as well.  I have played off and of for over forty years and have a closet full that if nothing else give me joy to own. 

I have have always been in awe of my father.  His ability to talk to anyone and to show them that he really cared about what they said.  I can do the former but the later is a little harder.  To pick up most anything he wished and master it.  I still cannot figure out how he could look across a pasture and walk right to the area where the Indians would have camped and proceed to gather arrowheads that I never seemed to see first.  I appreciate the abilities that I did receive from him and miss him more than he would have ever realized.  I am sure he is in heavenly choir practice singing off key but with enthusiasm the same way he lived his life with enthusiasm.

This picture was taken sometime postwar probably at a summer camp.  Some where I have a picture of him doing this trick on skis.  My father worked for a number of years at summer camps as a counselor.  The photo below is of him as a life guard.  Also believed to be at camp.

My parents on their wedding day.  this was taken at my grandparents farm in Santa Rosa Texas.

While dad could not sing he could dance and he and my mother enjoyed dancing.  This picture is believed to be from college in West Virginia.

Peter H. Curran Sr.

July 28th 1921 - January 10th 2004

The Leader of the Band