Whatever my parents thought might become of me as a young lad, little did they know how much I loved the “moral sense” in my mother and the “fearlessness” in my father, who lived by the premise that “fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” 

My mother, Virginia Ham, patched together values taught by her loving, quixotic father, and her bigger-than-life grandmother, Mamie Ham, and a collection of aunts, uncles, and cousins in the small textile town in northern Maine, Dover Foxcroft. Her mother Elsie died when she was only five because of the influenza of 1918. Her father, Stanley, a musician, led the local Town Band while working for his father, Willis Ham, in the Willis General Store. Within walking distance from her grandmother’s home in downtown Dover Foxcroft Maine, Virginia’s after school time was spent visiting one or more of her family’s enterprises: Willis Ham’s General Store, Pierce Appliances, or Maude’s Hat shop. There wasn’t much else going on in this textile and lumber town of northern Maine in the 1930’s. For entertainment, she learned to play the piano and played the part of pianist in school plays at Foxcroft Academy. After all, her father was a musician and appointed Town Bandleader. 

This attractive young woman, Ginny, met the handsome and popular, George, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Wickford, Rhode Island. Virginia escaped Dover Foxcroft for college in Providence and George was saddled with paying the bills for his divorced mother and siblings by joining management of the local woolen mill. A fully paid scholarship to a top college had to be turned down. 

No introductions were necessary that Sunday morning as eyes met, hearts flipped, and wedding bells rang out soon after for a couple destined to leave behind their conservative roots for a life of opportunity together. Virginia and George saved each other from lonely and tough growing years by their mutual love and their willingness to venture. 

The woolen industry, family, and church dominated their lives. My father, gifted in finishing fine woolen fabrics, accepted job opportunities from New England to Southern towns. I grew up walking the floors of the wool storage, carding and spinning departments, dyes houses, and cutting tables of the finished fabric of 100% fine wool. I loved the vinegar-like smell of the dye house, the lanolin infused bales of greasy wool in storage from Australia, the noisy clammer of weaving looms, and the comforting aroma of oil in the wooden floors. Most of all I loved being alone with my father who chatted with supervisors in each area of the factory. My father was the boss. He eventually started his own textile business. 

My mother ran the home, education, and recreational activities of the family. She was ready with the car to take one of the three of us children to piano lessons, basketball, Boy Scouts, or a friend’s birthday party. When I bought my paper route, I delivered door to door every afternoon and Saturday; on rainy days, I could count on my mother showing up with the car to help keep me dry. 

My father was the evangelist. Wherever his new textile employment took us from New England to the Carolinas, we had to find the Episcopal Church. I was expected to attend church, Sunday School, boy choir, and help serve as acolyte. Supporting the church financially was always a contentious decision for my parents. My father believed in tithing 10% and my mother believed in her home budget and what was left for the church. My father said this was a matter of faith, not budget, an argument that my mother always lost. We were casting our bread upon the water, wherever that took us for greater opportunity. 

I am grateful for the values that my parents imparted to me at a young age. They taught me how to balance my head and my heart, and in the end, I chose mission over safe living. I bet big on God’s way, and never wanted for money. My mentor, John Whitehead, always claimed, “better values build better value.”