December 12, 1965

Whew...forty years ago; but what a day!

It started about 6:00 p.m. on the 11th when we got a call at our Ambler Ave, Westville, NJ residence from brother Dave? How is Aleene? Any signs this might be the day? Naw, no signs.

Within two hours everything changed...the signs they were a coming. We piled into our 1963 Farilane, two door, stick shift and headed for the U.S. Naval Hospital, Philadelphia, PA. To get there we had to traverse the Walt Whitman Bridge which spans the Delaware River connecting South Jersery with Philadelphia. The weather was cold and rainy. It was about 9:00 p.m.

The hospital was an imposing building...maybe 15 stories...yellow brick and cold looking. There was a weekend duty party manning the maternity ward. They took Aleene in and told me I could wait in the waiting room...alone; nothing but 12 women's magazines. And there I sat for over eight hours. But never mind me, poor Aleene was in deep labor...alone. That's the way things were then.

Finally, at about 4:00 a.m., the duty OB came out and said that I was the father of a baby boy. Very perfunctory in manner and about as impersonal as one could imagine. I went home and made all the phone calls and Aleene and Jeffrey Scott (although we collectively decided on the name they were the first names of two Navy buddies...Jeffrey Bergen and Scott Hubbard) stayed in the big old hospital for four or five days. So that was the beginning.

Within two weeks Jeff was sleeping nights. Within ten months he was walking. He was curious and acted like a sponge...soaking up everything he saw. By three he recognized the logos of the various gasoline brands...Gulf oil was "Gall gas" and the others had their short pharasiology. He knew them all.

As our friends said yesterday, "Jeff was so cute," and they didn't know him until he was six. He was academically inclined, liked books and became a Steeler fan in the hayday of Terry Bradshaw and Franco Harris.

His dream since second grade was to be a weather man...and that's what he is today fulfilling a life long dream. He made it happen by working, signing up for the Navy Reserve and heading off to Penn State, which probably has the best weather department in the country.

When he got out of college met jobs were scarce so he did a stint with Accu-weather during which he made a three month deployment to be involved in the Gulf War. That was tough for us. He seemed to take it in stride.

He was determined to be in weather and took a year's contract to the South Pole which was a significant experience...as one might expect. Hanging on to the weather business he spent two summers in North Dakota herding young pilots up into the wild blue yonder to seed clouds when the weather began to rumble.

Finally the NWS began hiring and he headed to Jackson, KY. That was a lonely outpost...perhaps even more so than The Pole. It was there that Jeff began developing a deeper relationship with God. He took a transfer to Gaylord, MI and the spiritual growth began, slowly at first, then accelerating over the next six years.

Then...whew...he met Mary. The rest is a matter of record from the recent past. And while not to blow off the significance, is too personal for Pappy to even begin to go there.

The point is, this is The Boy's fortieth birthday. He has always been with us...being born just eleven months after our wedding (and most of that time we were separated while I was in the Navy.) He has been my scientific advisor, my sounding board for many topics, and a source of pride all these years. We both love Penn State and the Steelers...well, anything Pittsburgh and while Aleene and I begin to shift our living toward the Pacific Northwest, I have a sense that the phone calls and the get togethers will be rich in meaning. And we know we are leaving him in good hands.

So...in this age of cyberspace where all can see what you write .... I declare our (mine and Aleene's) love for this forty-guy and wish Jeff a very Happy Birthday. And, may you have many, many more!