It is hard to believe
that someone like Jack can be gone now.
In so many ways, Jack was immortal. When we think of him, we always think of infinite existence.
He was so strong, so brilliant, and even though he has passed, he is infinitely immortal to us.
Growing up with Jack was not for the faint of heart. He was not risk averse , and he invited a level
of risk that could be life threatening. There was never a tree, a telephone pole, a roof, a smokestack, or a cliff that was
too high or too steep for Jack to climb, always unconcerned by the decent which often proved to be a precarious challenge.
it might have involved climbing down a cliff to get to Pulpit Rock instead of going up the easy way. It might have been climbing
up the 100 foot smokestack at South Jr. High, evenin the closing darkness, just to prove that it could be done. lt might have
been driving the family car on a snowy road in high school with his friend, Paul Sweeney, as a passenger, and practicing skidding
before wrapping the car around a tree. Or it might have been walking to Dawes School in third grade and finding a smelly dead
skunk to bring in for everyone to experience. Whatever the trip, going from point A to point B with Jack often involved an
unconventional event before reaching the final destination.
Jack grew up in a household where sports were a bit of a religion. He also lived in a neighborhood
and city where sports assumed a high priority. He was passionately competitive, and his love for competition was far reaching:
football, baseball, basketball, ping pong, pool, badminton, arm wrestling, Wiffleball, darts, marbles, Capture the Flag, Tom-Tom
Pull Away, cowboys and Indians, and even hide and seek. Whatever the game or activity, a score was being kept, and Jack hated
to lose.
As a kid he played baseball every day in the summer at Root Park ( South Jr. High ) with a group
of neighborhood buddies that included : Mike Coughlin, Tom and Dave Giddings, Paul Sweeney, Butch Scarfoni, John O'Neill,
Dave Walsh, Jim Bridges, Bill McGurk, Jim Farrell and brother Paul. This was a time when adult supervision was quite relaxed
and mothers did not expect you back home unless you had a wound that required stitches or a broken bone that needed to be
set. Not surprisingly, Jack had to return home early a few times, once with a badly broken nose after being hit squarely in
the face with a baseball. Jack later played many years of organized baseball on Little League and Babe Ruth League teams and
was chosen to East Little League All Star team.
Jack learned to play basketball at the Boys Club (indoors) and outside in the winter cold at Leighold's
and the Giddings courts. In the unofficiated outside games, shot blocks were rare but body blocks were common. Actually, Jack
was an accomplished basketball player in his youth and played on the Boys Club All Star team with Pittsfield basketball legends
Fred Cox, Kirk Leslie, and Mike Mole. Jack always took great pride in his 6th grade Dawes School team, led by Jerry Lee, that
won the city championship, a big deal back then. The school celebrated with a spaghetti lunch for the champs, which was very
special, for food was never served at school because kids went home for lunch. When he reached high school, Jack's physical
style of play wasn't favored by the officials. Back then basketball wasn't considered a contact sport, and Jack was asked
to leave a few games early - you might say he was thrown out. So he decided to concentrate on his favorite sport, football.
Growing up, Jack played on a number of neighborhood football fields: Millers lot, Giddings back yard,
Root Park and in the road on Thompson Place across from the O’Gara house. There were no uniforms, of course, and equipment
varied from player to player, a few had 5 and 10 cent store bought helmets or shoulder pads. One thing was consistent, though,
the ”Jack Rule". Jack was so much bigger and stronger than everyone that he was not allowed to carry the ball because
no one could tackle or bring him down. However, he was allowed to tackle, a major problem for the rest. With the Farrell,
Coughlin, Lee, Giddings and O’Gara families all within shouting distance, Thompson Place was home to more football than
car travel, much to the dismay of Mr. Preston who lived next to one goal line. The football played in the road was, theoretically,
safer because it was touch football. However, one goal line was marked by a telephone pole that was in the field of play.
Instead of running the common pass patterns, a ” post” or a " flag”, a “pole” route was often
used. This involved swinging around the pole and catching the ball in front of it. Jack was executing this pattern once and
caught a pass from Dave Giddings just as he ran head first into the telephone pole and was out cold for some time. However,
he held onto the ball so the touchdown counted. It was one of many concussions, most likely. Jack went on to be an outstanding
high school football player, and he was selected All Berkshire his senior year, and is a member of the Pittsfield Football
Hall of Fame. He played at Yale and his aggressive style led to a nickname, "The Beast of Berkeley College”.
Many other competitions took place on a daily basis in Jack's youth. The Giddings house, reached
by a short stroll down Thompson Place and through a hole in the fence, was a second home to Jack and the neighborhood kids.
On a typical evening, games of ping pong, pool, darts, and even an occasional boxing match were taking place in their cellar,
and score was being kept.
Although sports were a primary focus, Jack had some lesser known talents, interests, and activities
as a kid. He had considerable artistic ability and won a prize for his Sphinx sculpture during a Pittsfield Winter Carnival
contest one year. He was a well regarded youth member of the Hoffman Bird Club and a regular bird watcher at Brielman's swamp
and the Pittsfield sewer beds. In 1952 Jack was the grammar school winner of the Berkshire Museum nature hour based on weekly
testing over the year after watchingnature movies. Dave Walsh was also among the top finishers. Yes,
they really did keep score.Unfortunately, his musical talents were most likely inherited from his father, Roger, rather than
his mother, Lucille, who taught music at the nearby music school. Jack took trombone lessons and played in the South Jr. High
band. Music was one of the few things in which Jack did not have a very good score.
Jack never took the path of least resistance. He rarely started fights , but he , also, never avoided
or backed down from them. He could beat you with his brains or beat your brains out. His opponents were frequently surprised
that this studious looking kid turned out to be so tough. On one occasion, lack was challenged to step outside with someone
because lack had asked him to stop swearing in the presence of his date. The fight was a brief one, and Jack's opponent turned out
to be a professional boxer whosaid , ”Don't you know who l am ?" before swinging at lack and missing. One punch
later from lack and the 6’ 4", high ranking state heavyweight contender lay sprawled in the Green Door parking lot,
out cold. Many who were witness to Jack's epic battle with Neil Marshall in the Catholic Youth Center locker room believe
that the classic Ali-- Frazier fight was mild in comparison.
Jack's brains were stronger than his fists, however. He was identified quite early as having a near
genius level IQ and went on to excel academically with near perfect College Board scores and a National Merit Scholar designation.
He was accepted at every college to which he applied and chose Yale, much to the delight of Roger and Lucille. His roommate
at Yale was his neighbor and long time friend, Mike Coughlin Jack and Mike were not only close together at Yale but were close
to death together in a spectacular car crash in Dalton during the summer of 1962. The report said that they were travelling
at a very high speed when the car left the road for 280 ft before it hit a telephone pole, snapping it in half. The car then
flipped over and rolled 200 ft down the road. The good news is that not only did they survive, but they scored quite
high on style points, for Walt Decker, the Dalton Chief of Police, said it was the most sensational car accident he had ever
seen.
Jack handled the challenging environment at Yale with great aplomb, and he did not always fit the
brainy lvy League stereotype. His nickname from friends "the Beast”, was partly because he was a terror on the football
field, but there were probably some other things that contributed to that moniker.
Jack was protective, truthful, and honest to a fault sometimes. He seemed to always be there
at times of need and stress. He pulled brother Paul out of Onota Lake when Paul's ambition exceeded his ability when swimming
out to the big dock and he went under and took on water. As kids, adults always asked Jack's opinion when there was
a "who did what?" question, because they knew he always told the truth, not a common trait among 10 year olds. When
he was older sometimes his straightforward, honest approach could be a little shocking to people. Examples of a few
expressions that were used to persuade people who were irritating him are: "If you don't go away fat boy, l’m going
to flick your ear;" "If you don't stop talking like that, l’m going to throw you out the window;", " If you
try to cut this line, l'll turn you upside down and eat you like cupcake.” The desired change of behavior usually
resulted.
Jack had a long and successful business career with stops at Peat, Marwick, Mitchell & Co, Atlantic
Richfield, and Ashland Inc. He travelled around the world and lived in many interesting places. His most important stop was,
however, Ashland, Kentucky where he met Marcia. Jack and Marcia were married October 1, 1982. Since Marcia had two fine daughters,
Allison and Cheryl, Jack was immediately a family man. He mellowed somewhat, and he became reasonably housebroken, not a bad
thing. Marcia was a great influence and Jack, as they say in the Bible, “put away some childish things". Although not
a religious person, he learned a bible truism "love never faileth".
In 1990 Jack founded the Tom Giddings Memorial Scholarship in honor of his dear friend Tom Giddingsand
his humanitarian efforts in Africa, who had passed away in January of that year. Under Jack's guidance and with the help of
friends whom he recruited, the Tom Giddings Scholarship has becomeone of Jack's greatest legacies. It is the single largest
award in Berkshire County and is a testimony toJack's fine character as well as Tom's.
Jack returned to Pittsfield which was part of his final mission. He knew, regardless of where he
had lived, that Pittsfield was his town. Here, he was able to look back with such fond memories, it was tantamount to living
twice.
He fought cancer with his typical tenacity, and it did not beat him. Few things did. His attitude
toward receiving treatment involving possible debilitating levels of radiation and chemotherapy was, " bring it on!".
Jack and Marcia’s beautiful Pittsfield home was a very active place, hardly a retiree atmosphere.
Book were being written, stock markets were being evaluated, sports betting pools were being managed, and every sporting event
was being viewed on television. It was a bit like ESPN Central and, yes, scores were being kept. Fortunately for Jack,
Marcia shared his love of sports.
In the hospital last January, Jack still looked indestructible, every bit the warrior even though
he was barely conscious and on a breathing machine with tubes everywhere. When asked about his chance of survival, the doctor
said he thought at best they were only 1 in 9. He obviously didn't know Jack and the fact that if he jumped off a 12 story
building, he would still be favored to survive. When his nurse, a very big strong guy, inquired about Jack's background, it
was mentioned that he never lost at arm wrestling. To this the nurse replied he would have had trouble with a big dude like
himself. When Jack didn't jump up from the hospital bed and say to nurse, "Let's go!", we sensed the end was near.
We are trying to adjust to Jack's not living forever. Immortality is a longshot, the odds are certainly
against it. However, we thought Jack had a chance because he had defied the odds so many times before. One of Jack's
frequent expressions growing up was "Let me go first". He would do this to make sure it was safe for others to follow.
At the edge of a cliff, he would step forward, confident that he would find firm footing, or, if not, he would surely
learn to fly. Well, you have gone first again, Jack, but one day we will follow and join you. Until then, we will
miss you so very deeply, for we not only loved you, but in many ways, we worshipped you.
Your Loving Family
