ANTHONY F. VISCONTI 1917-2005

If it were possible to describe my father in one word, although he was a complicated man, that word would be generous. Early in his life he learned the cruel lesson of self-sacrifice. His immigrant mother had to do anything she could to make ends meet. She taught her young children how to make artificial flowers and they did this night after night, sitting around the kitchen table. Once the flowers were made, my young father would stack them in a box and deliver them to a retailer. When he was in his early teens, he got a job with Western Union as a telegram delivery boy. It was a tough job delivering telegrams on his bicycle in all kinds of horrible weather all over New York City. All of his earnings went back to his mother, to help her support her family of three children. But his uniform and handsome, chiseled profile caught the attention of a local Brooklyn girl, Josephine Campo, and they became sweethearts. After three months of dating he asked her for permission to kiss her. Can you imagine that these days? My father had a brilliant scholastic record in high school and was awarded a college scholarship. Unfortunately he had to turn it down so that he could continue to support his family.

My father and mother were married at the beginning of WWII and did their best to enjoy a few years of wedded bliss before they had me. My father enlisted in the National Guard before they were married and he was always on call for active duty to fight 'over there' but that never happened. Throughout the war years my father worked as a shipwright at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and built battle ships and aircraft carriers. I was born after the war had ended, but my father was finally drafted into the United States Navy and left our home for over a year. He applied to be released from active service on the grounds that he had a young wife and child, and that the war was well over. Fortunately he was discharged from the Navy honorably. When he came home he was wearing a sailor's uniform and a new moustache. I didn't recognize this stranger and I cried when I saw him.

I grew up to the sound of live music in our Brooklyn household. My mother would have the Italian radio station on all day and she sang along while she cooked and did housework. My father was already an amateur accordion and harmonica player, and he played both almost everyday -- even in the bathroom (for the acoustics, obviously). Once a week the other members of his Barbershop Quartet would come to our apartment and I was exposed to "Sweet Adeline" and four-part harmony. We owned an ancient music roll piano and a cheap guitar, these were my toys and I was encouraged to play and sing whenever the spirit took me. When I was five my parents bought me a ukulele for Christmas. I quickly learned how to play it with my father's guidance. Thereafter, my father regularly taught me all the good old fashioned songs. I could never have a better teacher in those days than my father.

When I grew older I began to see how generous my father was. His day job was working on a building site as a carpenter in all kinds of weather, and then he'd work at night building and installing furniture and cabinets as a second job. I later found out that he often did this for free for relatives and close friends. He could never let people down. Sometimes his pay would be a trade for food or other commodities he could barter for.

When I started to show obvious musical talent my father wrote a letter to Frank Sinatra imploring him to give me a break. His reasoning was that 'Old Blue Eyes' and him were around the same age, had sons around the same age and were both born in New Jersey. I learned about this when I was in my thirties, from my mother - my father never told me. I don't think my dad got so much as a 'bad-da-bing' for a reply, but it must have taken courage to write that letter. My father and mother supported me in many creative ways. The ukulele was the first of many instruments they had bought for me. They got me a guitar when I was eleven, which my son Morgan uses until this day. They paid for 3 years of guitar lessons; they bought me a bass fiddle, which I still play. Although they originally thought of music as a hobby for me, they were both very supportive when they saw that I could actually make money at it. No one else in our family was a professional musician so this took an enormous leap of faith on their part. Those instruments were expensive by our working class standards, but my dad made sure that I had them. We used to jam at home all the time. Our last jam session was this past Christmas. Dad played his harmonica, mom sang in English and Italian, and I played guitar. I'm so happy that we could share that musical experience for one last time. Although senility took its hold on my dad, his eyes would sparkle and he'd come alive when we played music together.

My dad's sense of humor was direct and sometimes surreal -- his quick wit is well known amongst our family and friends. He raised me on Spike Jones records and W.C. Fields movies, and his sense of humor fell somewhere in between. Once, when I was a kid, I asked him, 'when lovers in a film kissed where did the violins came from?' Without a pause he said the male actor had a transistor radio in his shirt pocket and he turned it on just before the kiss. I knew he was pulling my leg, but he matched the absurdity of my question with a great spontaneous joke. I know that his grandchildren all adored his terrific sense of humor too, the willing victims of similar jokes.

In the last 17 years of his working life, my father was finally rewarded with having landed a great job as first, a maintenance engineer, and then a senior locksmith with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Finally he came indoors to work and his hands and heart became softer. Not content with being an ordinary worker my father volunteered for many of the charity fund raising programs by joining the Federal Reserve Club. This was a social club that performed concerts, musicals and plays for charity. My dad's skills as a carpenter enabled him to build elaborate stage sets. Of course, he also sang, acted and directed in all the productions. Ultimately he was elected as the president of the Federal Reserve Club, being the first blue-collar worker in that organization to do so. He was immensely popular and universally admired during his period of employment and honored with a gala retirement party.

Because my father had relatives in Pennsylvania he always had it in the back of his mind to retire there. But my mother was more than a little reluctant to move away from Brooklyn, which was home to her for her entire life, and being extremely attached to family and friends there. So he softened the move by buying their house in Walnutport, Pennsylvania only as a weekend retreat at first. They had quickly made friends with the 'locals' (everyone there will acknowledge how easy it was to make friends with my parents) and my mother grew to love this place. Upon retirement they left their Brooklyn apartment and became permanent citizens of Walnutport. Both my parents could not sit still for very long and simply call themselves retired. They immediately threw themselves into community life doing anything they could to help the parish and Father McElduff. Mom and dad joined a team of women and men who made thousands of pierogies by hand for church sales, raising lots of money for the St. Nicholas parish. My father's reward was being asked to sing in the church choir. Daddy sang bass. His commitment to the choir is legendary; I have seen the respect and love in the eyes of other choir members at the mention of his name. He not only sang in the choir, but his diverse musical background helped to add a higher level of sophistication for to the sound and repertoire, and in between rehearsals his rascally humor kept them entertained.

As if church activities weren't enough, he always found time to use his carpentry and lock smith skills make repairs to the church, and to help his neighbors at Mountainview Court by putting up shelves to building entire porches, all in the name of friendship. And when dad was building, you could be sure that mom was in the kitchen cooking, introducing her new friends and neighbors to the exotic sounding dishes of manicotti, braciole and melanzane di parmigiana. Okay, so now Walnutport has Mama's and Valley Pizza, but they didn't back then.

My father loved people, children and pets. In recent years, when old age slowed him down, he would still get out that old accordion or harmonica and entertain for any occasion -- after a family dinner or a church function -- or to a crawling infant or a little dog. Those who knew him will never forget my dad's spirit and generosity. Both Palmerton Hospital and my parent's home have recently been full of sympathetic friends who spoke nothing but praise and love for my dad. I am especially grateful to Father McElduff for being such a strong support to my mother, especially after my father took ill.

My dad's life has been a wonderful journey. His generosity has touched many people. He seems to have done everything right and I'm positive that he's had no regrets. You've got to love a man who stayed with the same woman for 65 years and was romantic until the last day. I am still learning from his examples.