Oct 17, 2010 By Mark O'Keefe 7 min read

“This meeting will now come to order.” My mother used to tease my dad that his idea of heaven would be St. Peter uttering those magic words.

Well, my dad may very well be seeing that dream come true as he died of natural causes on Sept. 19 at the age of 89.

For whatever reason, he liked meetings as he attended countless numbers of them during his life. He belonged to all types of clubs and boards and the thing was that he didn’t join just to say he was a member. Once he joined a club or group, he became an involved member, often serving as an officer.

But while he liked meetings, he truly loved his church, community and most of all, his family.

It’s a shame that few people here never got to know him because he was a kind and compassionate man. He was a good man who lived a good life, but it was not an easy life. As a youngster, his dad died of cancer and he watched as his mother took over the family store, working 10-12 hours a day, seven days a week.

He learned at an early age the meaning of work, doing whatever he could to help his mother run the store.

A 1940 graduate of Monaca High School in Beaver County, he joined the armed forces after Pearl Harbor. He was a member of the US Army Air Corps, where he was stationed in Australia, New Guinea and the Philippines.

After coming home from the war, he went to work at the Westinghouse plant in Beaver, where he worked until retiring in 1984.

In the meantime, my dad and mom raised five boys and three daughters. How they did it on my dad’s modest salary remains a mystery. Of course, I never realized all the sacrifices they made until I raised a family myself.

We didn’t always have the most expensive clothes or the newest gadgets, but we did all the things other kids did. There were annual trips to Kennywood and Pirate games along with vacations to Geneva-on-the-Lake in Ohio.

We certainly weren’t bored as there were a zillion kids in the neighborhood, and we were always playing sports or running around doing something. We might not have been the richest kids in town, but no one had more fun than us.

A big part of growing up was going to church. My dad was always hauling us off to Mass, and if by some chance he’s not in heaven now, then we’re all in big trouble. He was definitely the best Roman Catholic I ever knew, going to Mass and communion as often as possible.

And that was just the tip of the iceburg. He didn’t just go to Mass, he was an active member of the church, singing in the choir and being a member of the church committee, St. Vincent de Paul Society and the Parent Teachers Guild, where he served as president.

He was a lifelong member of the Holy Name Society, serving as secretary and president. He was also marshal of the Beaver County Holy Name Deaneary, which named him its Man of the Year in 1985.

For him, practicing religion was not something you just did on Sunday. He tried to help others everyday of the week as evidenced by his dedication to the community.

He served for six years on the Monaca School Board, where he found himself in the middle of a bitter controversy in the 1950s. My dad favored a merger with neighboring Center Township. He knew that Monaca had no room to grow and thought a bigger high school would be able to offer a better education for the town’s young people.

But others fought the merger and put out all types of vicious rumors about my dad. There were prank phone calls and other political mischief that went on. My dad ended up losing the election but he never wavered in his belief that a merger was the right thing to do. He could have given in and probably won the election but it was more important for him to stand up for his principles.

Ironically, Monaca and Center Township did finally merge this year, a move which had my dad grinning from ear to ear.

He also served as a Monaca Borough councilman for eight years in the 1970s. Again, he held firm to his principles and was never invited to the meetings before the meetings or the meetings after the meetings.

He also served on numerous other community boards and for his efforts was inducted into the Monaca Hall of Fame in the 1990s. It was always one of his proudest achievements.

In addition to being a religious man, my dad was also very patriotic. He belonged to both the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars, serving as commander in addition to numerous other offices. He also served on numerous statewide committees, often traveling to Harrisburg and Philadelphia for various functions.

One of his real loves later in life was serving as a member of the Beaver County Special Unit, which performed memorial services at funerals for veterans. He said the thing he enjoyed most was talking to family members, who were very grateful for the services the unit performed.

Of course when talking about my dad, you have to mention his love of sports. He loved Monaca High sports as some of my earliest memories are of him taking me and my brothers to high school football games. Being an Irish Catholic, he especially loved Notre Dame and its football teams. He had us believing as youngsters that it was practically a sin to root for any other team.

He also loved the Steelers but the Pirates always held a special place in his heart. I really enjoyed taking my son to games with him, and he never lost hope that somehow the Bucs would finally turn things around.

Toward the end of his life, though, my dad did realize one dream. Despite his busy schedule, my dad had always been very involved in our lives and always found time to offer some type of encouragement or advice.

And he always preached to my brothers and sisters that we were a family and we needed to help each other. While we had always been close, we became even closer during the last years of my dad’s life as everyone pitched in to help him.

It was difficult for me, living here almost two hours away. But I kept in touch with my family by phone and listened as they talked about how they were taking care of my dad, each doing something special to try and make his life a little bit easier.

I was proud of them, and I know my dad was proud too. Thanks to his example and inspiration, we had become the type of family he always wanted us to be. He’s gone now, but his legacy will live on for many years to come.

Mark O’Keefe is the executive editor of the Herald-Standard. He can be reached by phone at 724-439-7569, by e-mail at mo’keefe@heraldstandard or by regular mail at 8-18 Church St., Uniontown, Pa., 15401.