Funeral Oraion by William
Calloley Tremmel:
THEODORE
AUGUSTUS CALLOLEY
(1854-1943)
Theodore Augustus Calloley was born in Bowling Green, Missouri,
August 11, 1854.
His father died when he was very
young. When he was eighteen months old, his
mother moved with him to Patosi, Wisconsin. There it was that he first learned to
read and write. When he was fourteen years
old his mother sent him to Montgomery City, Missouri to be a tinner's apprentice.
After three years apprenticeship, he returned
to Patosi. But he did not want to be just an unlettered tinner, so he re-entered
school and continued his studies.
In 1878 he traveled to Colorado to see first-hand what kind of place it
was. He must have liked what he found, because
he deserted it only long enough to return to Patosi and marry Eva Sarah Gibson.
They were both on their way to Colorado.
For the first years they were in Colorado, Theodore (his wife called him
Thode) explored for gold and worked in mines
in Central City, Dumont and Freeland. There in the grandeur that was so much a
part of those places three of their six children
were born--Myrtle, Edward, Warren.
In 1886 they
moved to Denver, where two more of their children
were born--Eugene and Ethel.
In 1892 they moved
to Englewood, where their last child (Eva Ruth)
was born and where they spent the rest of their lives.
After leaving the mines, Theodore worked
for thirty-one years for the Denver Bedding Company; and then for twenty-three
years he was associated with the Davis Brother's
Drug Company.
During all this time he was an
active member of his community. He was Englewood's
first alderman and one of the first people to work for and promote schools and
churches for his town.
In
1938, at age 84, he retired, and for the next five years enjoyed the kind of life he so
enjoyed--working in his garden, with
his flowers, visiting with his children and his children's children, or just sitting with
his wife on their wide front porch,
where the door was always open for those folks who always
dropped-in.
On September 18, 1943, Theodore
Augustus Calloley left us, but not really.
These are
some of the facts of my Grandfather's life--a
rather cold tabulation of a few of the things that he did. But this is not enough. He
was so much more. Perhaps he could
be best described as a big man composed of a little bit of Irish, with all the warm
and sparkle and kindness and fine humor
which is part of the Irish way. And he had a smile that made you feel good
inside.
He was the
kind of person who instinctively loved people. He was always willing to believe the
best about a person; and where there
might be some question, to give each one the benefit of the doubt.
And he
believed in me, even when I did not really
believe in myself. He believed in me and his believing meant more to me than I can
ever say.
We
have come here today to show, in this special way the love we have for this man;
love which was born in and nurtured by the
love he had for us. His love and our love is not gone. He is with us still and he
always will be with us--in our minds,
in our hearts.
Yes, we have come here to pay
respect to a kind and loving man. But in reality,
no words that I can make can ever do him justice. He needs no elaborate eulogy or
carved memorial to keep the quiet strength
and splendid sweetness of him remembered. He so endeared himself to us that he is
forever enshrined in our hearts. He will
not be forgotten. And in the not-forgetting, in the ways he affected or lives, he will
live on.
There
is a beautiful hymn which, I think, is the very symbol of his later
life:
Lead kindly light,
amid encircling gloom,
Lead thou me on! The night is dark, and I am
far from home; Lead thou me on!
There never was a man who, especially in the latter years of his life,
sought more for the light than did Grandfather,
and I am sure he found it.
Lead kindly light,
Lead thou me on!
It
was his faith; his living creed, and neither man or God ask more of any man than
that.