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To: rainbow sprinkles
I know I’ll be famed for this but what that family did cheapened this man’s life *and* his loyal,courageous service.There are far more dignified ways to pay homage to a serviceman at the time of his death.
12 posted on 05/11/2007 6:00:27 AM PDT by Gay State Conservative ("The meaning of peace is the absence of opposition to socialism."-Karl Marx)
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To: Gay State Conservative
Personally, I don't think it is for us to say. From the article ...

Mr Prendergast jnr - who was helped by his brother Ian, 49, and several younger members of the family - said his father would have approved.

"Dad was a frugal chap. Every single bit of cardboard we used to make the plane he had stored religiously in the garage for future use."

13 posted on 05/11/2007 6:03:13 AM PDT by Daffynition (The sum of the intelligence on the planet is a constant; the population is growing.)
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To: Gay State Conservative
Hello! this thread is about my lovely Dad. Yes he was cremated not buried. Yes we were charged by the funeral people far too much for the coffin. But no, I don’t think we were being disrespectful. My brother in your picture, made the coffin into a hurricane because my Dad had made him a little hurricane out of a tea chest and a plank when he was a child. It took all weekend to make and paint the coffin. It was outside in the garden while we were working on it and neighbours and friends dropped in to say hello! Everyone smiled. Lots of us cried and still are crying.
My dad and me made a little film just before he went into hospital (for the operation he didn’t recover from).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbwYTfoiHII

It is not at all respectful but Daddy loved it. It took me a few hours to film and hours and hours to dub. Like the cardboard coffin it was a little act of love.
What about the newspaper articles?
My Dad was 85. Apart from the people we knew he knew he must have known hundreds of others- He stopped to pick up hitchhikers. He helped people whose cars had broken down. He went off hang gliding Now lots of people know about him and unfortunately, they wouldn’t know if there hadn’t been a hurricane shaped coffin.
Death is not a very dignified event, I now know. We were celebrating our Daddy’s life!

Andy P (aged53)
my dad’s sister (70 something) called to say she was shocked by one of the newspaper articles, Why? Because she had no idea I was so old...

14 posted on 05/13/2007 12:13:10 PM PDT by Andy Prendergast
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