Category: Family
20 Years Ago Today – C-17 First Flight
Twenty years ago today, on September 15, 1991, the C-17 Globmaster III made it’s first flight. My father, Bill Casey, was the pilot in command on that flight. Today he is at Edwards Air Force with my mom, to watch that very plane known as T-1 return and be retired from service.
Take a few minutes if you have them to watch this video about that flight, the voiceover at the end is my Dad speaking. When I think of all the servicemen and women who have been delivered and returned in C-17s over the last 20-years, I burst with pride at the important role my father had in the development of this aircraft.
Congrats Dad, the First Flight crew, and to everyone at Douglas Aircraft on this special anniversary!
Send a Casey to Ireland
There once was a girl from Montclair.
Who had pretty reddish blonde hair.
She said with a smile.
Throw money on my pile.
So I can go study over there.
– Rick Palermo
This limerick by a family friend, captures well my daughter Katie’s online efforts to raise money in support of her plan to study abroad at the University of Limerick in Ireland next year. She has already won a $5,000 scholarship, which combined with existing student loans and her parent’s regular tuition payments will cover the majority of her expenses. But there is a gap in her budget that remains to be closed, and so she has put out a digital tin cup and is asking for your help.
Limerick isn’t just another spot in Ireland for us. It happens to be where our Irish ancestor’s came from. Katie’s GGGG Grandfather Michael Casey worked as a tenant farmer on the Barrington Estate (today’s Glenstal Abbey), and most of his 10 children, including son Michael, emigrated to America and settled in Chicago, Illinois. So Katie won’t just be studying abroad, she’ll be walking in the footsteps of the ancestors who gave her our Casey name.
After looking over a few alternative sites for online fundraising, Katie selected one called smartypig. Gifted funds are held in an FDIC insured, interest bearing account, from which she’ll be able to withdraw them when needed for her study abroad expenses.
Online fundraising such as this is the meat and potatoes of my day job, funding Democratic candidates and progressive causes that I support and am proud to work for. But this is a cause that beats them all, for being one that I support, and that makes me proud. The hardest, but most important part of fundraising is the asking. And so we ask. If you are able and willing to pitch in to help, your support is very much appreciated.
African or European?
Me: (asking for no particular reason) What’s the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?
Colleen: (without a moment’s hesitation) Is that an African or European swallow?
Me: (tears up with fatherly pride).
Why Will The Cubs Win This Year?
A Boy and His Lion
Christmas 1993, Huntington Beach, California. Will Casey is three weeks past turning one year old and celebrating Christmas at his Nana & Papa’s house. It’s Will’s second Christmas, but his first with awareness. Too young to know or care about Santa or Baby Jesus, Will knows only that there are lots of new toys being opened and they seemed to be for him. The toys stacked taller than he was, and from the safety of his mother’s lap, Will took it all in. He really wasn’t feeling very well on this trip, but toys are great medicine. Among his sister’s gifts was a Lion puppet. It had plastic brown eyes, soft fur, and a huge bushy mane.
Will had to touch that mane, and he did.
From that moment on ‘Lion’ belonged to Will. They were together always. By the next Christmas, Lion even came along with Will and Katie when they visited Santa,
and when he joined his family for a White House family Christmas photo.
And when he wasn’t traveling with Will on such exciting days as the first day of pre-school,
Lion and Will could most frequently be found napping together, like they are here with Will’s Aunt Jill.
Luckily for Will, his kind and generous older sister never begrudged him for taking her gift. She understood that Lion and Will were friends.
There were others. Others who tried to compete for Will’s attention, and he was willing to give them a try. There was Abu,
and bunny.
There was Mickey,
and Pooh.
There was even eventually a baby sister, but pulling her hair just wasn’t the same.
None of them lasted (well, the sister did), and no one knows where they are now. Lion was always there.
And he still is today. A bit worn after 17 years (his tail fell off years ago, but it’s safely stored inside his puppet head), but still Will’s Lion.
The End.
Long Running Family Art Exhibit Closes
A exhibit of artworks by Colleen Casey on the back of the basement door in the Casey family kitchen came to an end today. The exhibit consisted primarily of works from her pre-school and kindergarten period, some of which are believed to date back to 2000 or earlier. When asked if she was surprised at the record-setting length of her exhibition, Colleen made it clear that she was not. “It’s because you love me best”, she stated confidently. Of course we do dear. But the lack of competition from any younger sibling artists should also be noted.
Digital Christmas Past
In the classic 1989 movie, Christmas Vacation, there is a touching scene where Clark Griswold spends an afternoon locked in his attic. He bundles up in some old clothes, discovers some old hidden Christmas presents, and get misty with nostalgia watching old holiday movies.
I’ve recently moved my online abode from one web host to another. The task involved taking some time to backup and transfer files from one to the other, and that brought about some fun discoveries in a digital analogy to Clark’s experience in his attic.
Way back in the year 2000, we took our annual family Christmas letter digital. No longer would we stuff, lick, label and stamp envelopes as we had for years. In the new millennium, our holiday wishes could travel the digital tubes of the net (Yes, there are some offliners to whom we will always have to send a hard copy letter, but they miss out on all the fun links).
Typically, in addition to sending our Christmas letter by email, I also post it to the web for easy sharing with afterthoughts or others who missed out on the email. For that first letter in 2000, we produced the below video (and made it available in high and low bandwidth versions in Quicktime AND RealPlayer!). And for any who care to dig deep into the Casey Family digital Christmas Letter archive, I say, “Get a life, and enjoy!” Here they are: 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007.
Stay tuned for this year’s letter coming soon!
Meet Wrigley
We’ve got a new member in our family! Wrigley is a boy, about three months old and 10 pounds. He’s a beagle mix, just rescued from a West Virginia Animal Shelter last week. He’s had an exciting day; long drive to new home, bath, new collar, outside to meet the neighbors, and now taking a well-deserved snooze on the family room floor.
Marion Dedera Casey (1913/Chicago, IL – 2008/Newport Beach, CA)
Today is my grandmother’s birthday. She would have been 95 years old, but sadly did not reach that milestone having passed away two months ago. She was the oldest of five children of Victor and Rose Dedera, and is survived by her sister Jean, her son William, three grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. Twice married to John Casey (and twice divorced), Grandma Casey lived a very independent life, raising my father as a single working mother during a time when that was nowhere near a common as it is today.
In recent years my interest in genealogy led to many wonderful hours visiting with ‘Gram’, looking at old family photos, and appreciating her is a way that could only come in adulthood. She laughed when sharing photos of her and friends at the beach, and was proud to show off memorabilia from her career at Amphenol which included company Christmas cards on which hers was the only female presence among the crowd of male executives. Late last year my brother discovered another interesting tale from Grandma’s working past. As a young woman she worked for the Mars candy company in it’s early days. She was one of the staff who was flown out to attend the founder Franklin Mars’s funeral in Tennessee in 1934. When I asked her when she stopped working for Mars, she responded, “When I got married. They told me there were plenty of young single women who would be happy to take my job, and that a married woman had no place in the workplace.” She said this with no bitterness or resentment, just acceptance that it was how things were. Another good story was finding out that she did not learn to drive a car until my teenage father was also just learning.
Gram was an active letter-writer who was always caring and curious about the lives of others. A postcard from 1988, when I had been married and lived in Virginia for less than a year is typical…
Good morning – It’s Fri. 3/25 – 10am and would you believe 88 degrees already – we’re having a heate wave – anyone for a nice cold dip? – I’m ready for work and looking forward to the week end as I’m sure you are – what do you do week-ends? – where do ya go? – what do ya see? – For me, Sat is a clean house, food shop day and Sunday a day of rest, with the O.C. Register spread all over the d.r. table or maybe a matinee movie. Luv ya, Gram C
I would like to send Gram a similar postcard now. Where do ya go and what do ya see? And I’d like to wish her a very Happy Birthday, and let her know she is missed.