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Dan Frate

Hamlet resident Dan Frate has good reason to be proud.  This year his grandson, Danny, graduated from University School where he distinguished himself as a scholar and an athlete, winning All Ohio honors.  Danny played baseball and basketball, but it was his skills on the gridiron that caught the eye of Harvard recruiters.  So this fall Danny will be playing football for Harvard.

Since his graduation Danny has spent his summer mornings working as Hamlet's waterboy, seeing that Hamlet's lush and colorful flower beds didn't go dry.  His afternoons are spend with his trainer working on weight and speed drills.  "I'm so proud of him," grandfather Dan says.  "He can do it all.  He's a brilliant student and athlete.  You can only imagine how thrilled a hard working Italian immigrant is to have a grandson going to Harvard on a scholarship."  Grandfather Dan was born near Rome and named Domiano Pasquale Frate.  He adopted the American name of Dan P. Frate.

When he was young Grandfather Dan yearned to play sports but the Great Depression intervened and instead he had to work his way through high school.  He recalls, "We were lucky to have a bat and ball.  We were lucky to have food on the table.  There was no money for sports uniforms."  When he was 15 and a student at Benedictine High School, he began to work for Fisher grocery stores.  He served in the Korean War from 1951 to 1953.  On his return to civilian life he took on two jobs - at the grocery chain and at a chemical plant - working 68 hours a week to support his family and see that all of his children received a good education.  He succeeded remarkably well.  Each of them graduated from college, another reason for Grandfather Dan P. Frate to be so proud.

Shirley Badger

Hillside resident Shirley Badger recently returned from an all-expense paid trip to San Francisco to participate in a Robert Frost poetry festival.  Frost was born in San Francisco.  A sell-out crowd attended the festival.  Shirley's son, Tim, lives in San Francisco and is also a poet.  "It was a dream to be there," said Shirley.  "It was the best I have heard Frost's poetry read since I heard him read it himself."  Shirley was a guest of Dr. Andrea Liu.  Andrea lived with Shirley during her medical residency at Case Western Reserve University.  Shirley rented space to students in her large Cleveland Heights home after her husband died.  She has remained close to Andrea and her family through the years.

Shirley knew Robert Frost since 1938.  During the summer of that year Frost lived in a cottage on her mother's family farm in Ripton, Vermont.  Frost taught at Harvard, Amherst, Middlebury, and many other colleges.  Later, he bought Shirley's aunt Eunice Noble's farm in Ripton.  He lived there until he died in 1963, leaving the farm to Middlebury College.  It is called the Homer Noble farm.  The cottage where Frost lived is still in the family.  Shirley, who now owns the cottage, is directing its renovation.  For years, it was a yearly rental property.  The family is now upgrading the cottage to rent to summer visitors and for family use.

Frost lectured in Ripton every summer.  Shirley attended these lectures as a young girl.  She first heard Frost lecture when she was 14.  "He was just a regular citizen of Ripton, a friendly neighbor everyone knew," says Shirley.  "His ordinary conversation sounded like a poem.  He was always making up words."  Shirley grew up on a farm in Middlebury, Vermont.  Ripton is fifteen miles up the mountain from Middlebury and Middlebury College.  She came to Ohio for college and graduated from Hiram College.  She says, "I was a townie.  Townies didn't go to Middlebury.  We were looked down on."  Her father was a dairy farmer with fifty milking cows.  "Frost loved country things," says Shirley.  "I love his poetry because everything is so familiar to me."

Shirley met Robert Frost when she was home from school one summer.  She was then a graduate student in Cleveland and was visiting her mother in Vermont.  There was a knock on the door and it was Robert Frost.  He wanted to see the cottage where he lived for a summer and had now become her mother's home.  "He was the greatest guy," recalls Shirley.  "He had a great sense of humor.  He wrote about his subtle humor:  'It takes all parts of in and outdoor schooling to get adapted to my kind of fooling.'  He was a learned philosopher, and botanist.  He knew every plant."

Robert Frost's philosophy and deep love of plants had a profound effect on Shirley's life.  She earned a doctorate in microbiology, taught microbiology for 25 years at Case Western Reserve.  In her spare time she earned the coveted title of Master Gardener.  Dozens of Hamlet Villagers draw on her expertise to help with their plants.

One of Robert Frost's best known poems, Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening, begins with this line:  "Whose woods these are I think I know."

"I think I know whose woods these are," Shirley muses.  "They're near our family farm in Ripton.

Mary Eaton and Bill Finnerty

When the skies are overcase and the wind just right, Hamlet neighbors Mary Eaton and Bill Finnerty grab their flyfishing tackle and head for the lake

Both Mary and Bill are ardent followers of Izaak Walton's sport, fly fishing.  The freezer in Mary's apartment is always filled with fresh frozen fish.  Bill likes to boast about the ones that didn't get away.  "I caught a lot of fish last week," he glows.  "The owner of Deep Springs Trout Club was showing me where to cast.  I caught a pile!"

Mary Eaton and Bill Finnerty have lived their lives in Chagrin Falls with similar interests and friends.  They did not know each other until they met through a love of fishing at Hamlet.

She is a member of Deep Springs Trout Club in Chardon.  Both Mary and Bill are members of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History Trout Club.  This group meets one day a month for dinner and programs on fishing.  They fish as often as possible.  "Neither of us drives anymore.  We have to find someone to drive us to the club to fish and have dinner."  Both keep their fishing rods by the door ready to go.  "Overcast weather is good for fishing," says Mary.  "You don't want a lot of sun."

"Always fish with the wind at your back," adds Bill.  "Never cast into the wind.  I have fished in Ireland six times.  My parents are from Ireland, County Mayo.  I skied a lot in Europe.  I combined the fishing trips with the skiing trips in Switzerland.  I served in the Ski Patrol at Peak N Peak and fly fished on weekends."  Bill was a salesman for Addressograph and later a manufacturer's agent.  He sold electronics and plastics.  He lived in Chagrin Falls right behind Hamlet.  His back property went down to the Chagrin River, where he loved to fly fish.  "I learned to fish in Grand Rapids, Michigan on a business trip.  People were fishing on a pier, worm dunking, and no one was catching anything.  I saw a guy casting a fly rod on the beach below, catching a fish on every cast.  That's when I know I wanted to learn to fly fish."

Mary fly fished with her late husband, George, in Canada, where they were members of the Salmon Club.  They also fly fished the Chagrin River and the Trout Club in Chardon.  She fished at the family home in Prout's Neck, Maine, where she summered.  Mary's father was an Episcopal Minister.  "I gre up in a family of five children in Poughkeepsie, New York.  My father died when I was five."  Mary boarded at the Baldwin School in Bryn Mawr, PA and graduated from Wellesley College where she studied science.  After school, she enlisted in the Navy Waves and served in the Bethesda, MD Naval Hospital in the lab.  She attended Boot Camp in the Bronx.  "We had to march down the streets of New York at 4:00 am!  Hup, 2,3, 4."  The President of Wellesley, Mildren McAfee was head of the Navy Waves.  That was the inspiration for Mary to join the Waves after college.

Bill served in WWII as a Senior Lieutenant, Naval Aviation.  He was a pilot and flight instructor.  Bill received a scholarship in aerodynamics at Fenn College, now Case Western Reserve University.  His mission was to test new airplanes out of the factories and fly them to the carriers.  He served an important role by training pilots.  Mary says she has to salute Bill when she sees him because he was an officer.  Bill still owns a Beechcraft plane.  His son, Kevin, is restoring the plane.  Bill used the plane for business.  He was a traveling salesman who traveled by plane.  "I got a lot of business that way," says Bill.    "I said, 'I'll be there in twenty minutes.'  I could land on sod and on farmers fields.  I was also a good golfer.  I sold a lot of stuff on the golf course."  His company competed with IBM.  He had the international Navy payroll system account that produced punch cards and checks.  Six million plates had to be made to print punch cards for the Navy.

Bill and Mary's lives went along in the same direction, but they didn't know each other before living at Hamlet.  Both Bill and Mary owned canoes.  They both were bird hunters.  Bill and Mary both lived in Chagrin Falls.  Bill's late wife, Barbara, was in Mary's tennis league.  They were good friends and played tennis together for years.  Hillside resident Ginny Nicholl was also on Mary's tennis team.  The league continues to socialize even though they no longer play tennis.  They gather at a local restaurant every Tuesday morning for breakfast.

Bill is a member of St. Joan of Arc and Mary is a member of St. Martin's Episcopal.  Mary irons the church linens for St. Martin's including the pure linen altar cloth that is not easy to iron.  Both Mary and Bill are gardeners and have plots in the Hamlet Community Garden.  Mary is a member of Country View Garden Club.  Bill plants green beans in his plot.  "I plant three different crops each summer.  I rotate my crop to constantly produce beans."  Both keep active by going to Tai Chi and Yoga at the Hamlet Clubhouse.  They both walk every morning to keep fit.  During bad weather Bill walks up and down the stairs in his apartment building to stay strong.

"Hamlet is a great place," says Mary.  "I walk down the hill to the dining room every day for lunch.  The food is good, the conversation is stimulating, and I've made great friends here, including my good friend Bill Finnerty.

Art Seyler

 

Art Seyler is proud of his 55 year Member Award of Sports Car Club of America, SCCA, North East Ohio Chapter.  Aft joined the club at age 35 in 1953.  The champion racecar driver has been a Hamlet Hillside resident for five years.  Art is a two-time cancer survivor and a man of tremendous spirit, strength, and determination.  He celebrated his 90th birthday last September by competing in class A sports car races on three different occasions at Nelson Ledges racetrack.  He drives a 2003 Mitsubishi EVO VIII with a 275-horse engine and a top speed of about 140 mph.

"A lot of people still call me Pappy Seyler.  My racecar has never been in snow.  I only drie it to races and short drives in beautiful weather.  The rest of the time it is in my Hamlet garage."  Art drives an Acura SUV around town and to visit his three children, seven grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren in Cincinnati, Swickley, PA, and Louisville.

"It's so slow driving in town in Chagrin Falls at 20 or 25 miles per hour," he says.  "It's nice to get on the track and let 'er go!  I like the turns.  Racing is all about making the corners, and that's the skill of racing.  It's very exciting."

Art retired in 1985 as Worldwide Director of Product Development for Master Builders.  He traveled around the world and the U. S. on business.  "I wore out four sets of luggage!  That's why I don't fly anymore!"  Art studied at Ohio State, left to serve for five years in WWII, then returned to school and graduated from Kent.  Five years experience maintaining war bombers prepared Art for the many all-nighters needed to maintain racecars.  As a crew chief, Art was responsible for the maintenance of his B24, which flew 87 missions.  He changed 16 engines.  Out of the 60 original planes in the bomb crew, Art's "Yankee Buzz Bomb" was one of the two that survived, and he flew home in it.

Art's racing career began in 1954 at age 35.  He borrowed an MG TD and raced at Akron Airport.  "My wife did not want me to race.  There were no roll bars, fire-resistant uniforms, or extinguishers at the time.  Racing is not really a dangerous sport.  They have a tremendous record, really, when you think of how many miles are raced.  Now, you have to go to driver's school to race.  I began without any training."

In 1961, Art bought a CType Jaguar factory racecar and competed in 41 regional and national races and one pro race.  Art had the confidence to compete, but didn't have a chance against the semi-pro teams.  He drove himself to and from 40 races.  Sometimes, he would drive all night, race for three days, and drive home.  He had to pull over during a traffic jam driving home in the Jag.  Most racecars do not have a fan and the engine would have overheated had he not stopped.

"My wife was shocked when I bought the Cooper Cobra."  The Lang Cooper Cobra 400 Hg went from 0 to 60 in 3.5 seconds.  Art raced 35 regional and national, and three pro races in the Cobra.

Art stopped racing in 1971 at age 51 when his demanding schedule at work allowed no time for it.  Sadly, Art's wife passed away shortly before he retired in 1985.  He then rebuilt his C Type Jag and returned to vintage racing.  He won first overall at Watkin's Glen for the first time in front of two of his children.  He paid $35,000 in 1986 for a Chevron B23 and raced in all the big Historic Can Am races, including Atlanta and Road America.  He later sold the C Type for $125,000.  He says, "I had no place to store it.  Now they go for $800,000."

He bought a Chevron B34 Fornmula Atlantic in 1991 and raced six races.  Art developed bone cancer at age 77.  He recovered and went on to race his last organized race in 1996 at age 77.  In 1998, he began running fast lapping "Fun Days" races at Nelson Ledges.  All types and engine sizes compete on the track.  Fifteen to twenty cars race 30-minute sessions flat out.  There are three classes of races; "A" for very experienced, "B" for average, and "C" for beginners.  There are no trophies and the races run all day.  There is a no passing rule 20 yards before or after a turn.  Nelson has a two-mile track with 13 turns, which gives a lot of room to go all-out most of the time.

Art recovered from the return of his cancer in 2004, then sold the big house in Cleveland Heights and moved to Hamlet.  He returned to the racetrack in 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009 at age 90.  "Racing is hard work.  It's hard work braking and shifting constantly.  It gets very hot in tihe cars and I would have to wring out my fireproof underwear.  I was always able to climb out of the car on my own.  Some guys have to be lifted out."

Spring is coming.  It won't be long before Art Seyler polishes up his shiny bright red Mitsubishi and heads for the track!

Michael Simeon

"Photographers would get on their knees to shoot her picture so as to make her look taller."

Hamlet's new resident in Building #2 is a former Commander in the British Navy.  He is an interesting person.  Shortly after moving in this past fall from Connecticut, he went on a trip to Namibia, located on the southwest coast of Africa.  This was Michael's third safari trip to Africa, having previously gone to Kenya, Tanzanie, Botswana and Zimbabwe.    

"Nature is the reason to travel to Africa.  The birds are as, or more, beautiful than the animals."  He took many photos, including pictures of lions, seals, giraffes, antelopes, warthogs, landscapes, school children, and Himba tribal women, "who wear little clothes, cover their bodies with red ochre, wear lots of jewelty, and have elaborate hair-do's."  Tanzanie holds his fondest memories.  "It has the nicest, friendliest people.  I would go back any time."

Michael Simeon had the privilege of commanding a Royal Guard on the occasion of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth sailing from Hull in the Royal Yacht Britannia for a State Visit to Norway in 1968.  "The Queen is very tiny," says Michael.  "Photographers would get on their knees to shoot her picture so as to make her look taller.  She only came up to my shoulder."  Michael first went to sea at the age of 17 in January, 1944, in the cruiser HMS Glasgow.  She supported the American landings on Omaha Beach on D-Day.  "It must have been a terrible shock for the Germans to wake up that morning and see hundreds of ships and craft on their doorstep."  They gave fire support to the troops as they moved inland.  Later he served on the battleship HMS King George V, the flagship of the British Pacific Fleet with two battleships, four aircraft carriers, four cruisers, and about 20 destroyers.  "We were attached to the US Fifth Fleet for the landings in Okinawa.  Our job was to interdict the airfields on the islands to its south to prevent the Japanese from flying in support.  This was done mainly by the carrier aircraft, but we went in close one day to crater the airfields with our 14" guns.  The drill was to spend two days on operations then to retire farther from the coast for two days, where we re-supplied at sea from tankers, ammunition and supply ships.  In this way we could stay at sea for long periods before we had to go into harbor for rest and repairs.  In our case, the main base was in Australia where I left the ship and went back to England in a troop ship.  I never got to celebrate the end of the war.  On V-E Day we were at sea off Okinawa and on VJ-Day the dry troopship had just left Panama heading East."

Michael left the Royal Navy in 1963 and entered Harvard Business School.  "The more senior officers spend less time at sea and more time in offices on shore doing bureaucratic work.  Not so much fun.  During my career I had assignments in California and Washington, DC for several years and had gotten to like the U. S. lifestyle.  So it was a "no-brainer" to go back for further education."  At HBS a quarter of the class were foreigners.

"Laughingly, we liked to say that our job was to broaden the minds of the Americans!  As you know very few Americans traveled abroad then."

After graduation he tried to get a job in England but with no success.  "At the time the concept of a Business School was unheard of there and so my training was wasted."  So, in mid-1965 he went to work for AMAX, a mining and metals company, headquartered in New York.  He met his wife, Ilona, in the elevator of the apartment building in which they both lived and they were married the following year.  After some job moves, they finally settled in Norwalk, Connecticut, and he conmmuted by train to New York.  Michael became the Vice President, Corporate Development.  He started new mines, bought and sold businesses, and planned projects for the company.

Ilona developed ALS in 1997.  Michael cared for her full time until she passed away two years later.  They have three children.  Diana is married to Robert Spadoni, an English Professor at Case Western.  Son, George, runs a boy's sports camp in Maine, Camp Skylemar.  His wife is a nurse.  Michael's sone, John, lives in California where and his wife teach near the eastern entrance to Yosemite National Park.

After living along in Connecticut for ten years, Michael moved to Hamlet to be closer to his daughter Diana and her three children who live in Shaker Heights.  He continues to have strong ties to Europe and visits at least once a year.  In England he has a sister living near Oxford and numerous nephews and nieces.  He also has relatives in Belgium and a younger brother in Queensland, Australia, who he hopes to visit later this year.  Michael keeps fit by taking long walks in the Chagrin area.  He also enjoys Hamlet's educational offerings such as the Case Western Reserve Discussion Courses.  This semester the course covers the Revolutionary Way and how it all began.  "I'm adjusting to life in the Midwest and am very happy at Hamlet.  The residents and the staff are just wonderful people."

Richard Rickard

Taken from The Times, January 7, 2010 (By Sali McSherry - Photo by Itamar Gat)

Ever since Richard Rickard, of Chagrin Falls, first bought a bird feeder for his wife and first daughter over 50 years ao as a gift, he became enthralled with birds.

A month after installing the feeder, he started keeping a list of birds that came to the feeder.  then he began his love affair with birding in an undeveloped green area behind his family's home in Warrensville Heights that hosted a wealth of birds.

Now, the retired University School English teacher and former Pepper Pike resident recently marveled at the birds that flock to the feeders outside of his third-floor window of the apartment he shares with his wife at Hamlet Village in Chagrin Falls.  Those birds include:  the gold finch, house finch, downy woodpecker, mourning dove, American crow, black capped chickadee, Caroline wren, robin, tufted titmouse, white-breasted nuthatch, and cardinal.

Mr. Rickard said he loves the simple activity, as well as identifying bird species and trying to understand their habits.  Birds have so much life, he said, and it gives him great joy to watch them darting in and out of bushes, feeding and even squabbling.

For those who love to watch birds from the comfort of their homes, Mr. Rickard suggests using several types of feed.  A feeder filled with oiled sunflower seeds will attract a plethora of seed-eating birds, Mr. Rickard said.

Suet feeders often draw woodpeckers, including the pileated woodpecker, which is several times bigger than other woodpeckers, and makes a sound in the woods like an ax chopping wood, he said.  Suet with peanuts appeals to Carolina wrens, he said.

Small seed like white millet is best sprinkled on the ground to attrack juncos, sparrows and a host of other small birds, but using cheap seed inundated with cracked corn and milo easily can beckon rats and mice, he said.

A tubular feeder with thistle seed he installed entices gold finches and in some cases house finches.  Last year Mr. Rickard said they experienced an invasion of pine siskins that cleaned out the feeder in a day.  A flock of 40 or 50 stayed from late November through early May, he said.

A couple of weeks ago, Mr. Rickard said he enjoyed birding at Lake Erie, where he saw mergansers and gulls ready for banquet time and the less frequently seen white-winged scoter duck and ruddy duck, which "certainly cheered me up," he said.

Currently, Mr. Rickard is participating in a five-year collaborative effort with the Ohio State Universitiy and Ohio Department of Natural Resources to identify bird-breeding activities in specific territories throughout Ohio for the state's Second-Breeding Bird Atlas.  Mr. Rickard is studying breeding areas including three consecutive blocks along the Chagrin River.

For those interested in birding, he suggested attending a meeting of the Kirtland Bird Club, where he is a member.  The club meets at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History on the first Wednesday night of each month.

He said a good field guide is important, such as the National Geographic Field Guide or guidebooks by David Sibley or Roger Tory Peterson.  Mr. Rickard suggested using center-focused binoculars witih 7 X 35 or 8 X 40 power that can be refocused quickly to catch the action of small birds.

The Cleveland Metroparks offers bird walks and a list of types of birds appearing in the region each month all presented in its publication.  The publication, the Emerald Necklace.  There are also park naturalists who can guide new birders, he said.

For more information about birding, call Cleveland Metroparks North Chagrin Nature Center at (440) 473-3370 or visit Kirtland Bird Club's website.