Casa Jonsson

I never met my mother’s father; he died of pancreatic cancer at age 62, a few months before I was born. People who knew him say that he and I would have got along very well.

I digitized a photo of Nip (his nickname from childhood) that I found lying around the cottage while we were on vacation this summer. It shows him in Europe with his best friend during the summer of 1929, after their graduation from Bowdoin. I love old pictures like this. I almost feel as though dialogue with the subjects is possible. John leafs through a magazine while my boyish grandfather rattles the ice in his glass and smiles off into the corner, his eyes sparkling. Is there a girl on his mind? Does he worry about his financial future? What will he do with his life?

Nip met his future wife at a wedding shortly thereafter. Susie was a sister of the bride and Nip was best man to the fellow who took the above picture, my great-uncle Bob. The Great Depression spared Nip professionally because he had been hired as a chemical engineer in the indispensable Explosives Division of DuPont. Highlights of his career at DuPont included his helping to bring to market a number of early plastics and synthetic materials including Dacron. (He gave Nana a chartreuse and black striped bangle of high-tech plastic as an engagement gift!) During his short retirement he wrote variety pieces for leisure and travel magazines.

There’s little denying that, however much our personalities may have had in common, I think I resemble him physically.