My Dad
by Amy Wikins Kress 2020
Speaking in front of large audiences is not something that I am comfortable doing. However, my father always encouraged me to take on new challenges and I am honored to speak about him today. For 24 years I have spoken at my dive team’s awards banquet and still I get emotional every time. So I’m hoping to borrow some of dad’s strength today.
Dad noticed the details and appreciated good quality. He taught me to appreciate things like solid wood furniture instead of veneer, engraved wedding invitations instead of printed, and the importance of wrapping gifts with clean and folded edges with beautiful hand tied ribbon.
The son of a Texan, classic country music fed his soul. He enjoyed artists like Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Tanya Tucker and Johnny Cash. When I was a little girl and rode in the car with him and the song Amy by Pure Prairie League came on the radio, dad would crank up the volume and we would sing it at the top of our lungs. And there was nothing like a great pair of cowboy boots. Preferably Tony Lamas.
He loved his Corvettes. And in his later years we urged him to get a safer car. He said his Corvette WAS safe because he could hit the gas and peel away from a possible collision if need be. In any case, he agreed to shop for a car that was not made of fiber glass and had a proper back seat. So he met that criteria while still satisfying his appetite for a fast car when he bought his Maserati. But he didn’t always have luxury sports cars. In the 70’s he had a small Mazda that backfired so loudly, his car announced his pending arrival a block away on the bottom of Stoneybrae Drive. Another car he owned, a Pontiac Phoenix, would stall every time he came to a complete stop, so I learned to hop out of his car while it slowly rolled forward when he gave me rides to high school. And I remember one time he picked me up from a drill team practice on the moped that he SAID he bought for my mother and we proceeded to bottom out as we rode out of the parking lot at J.E.B. Stuart High School.
Speaking of gifts, he was the best gift giver. If you said you liked something, he was going to remember that and find a way to get it for you. Whether it was a ‘My Pillow’, requested by my five year old at the time, or a watch with a 24 hour dial with only one watch hand, dad came through without question. The only misfire came one Christmas when my husband Adam mentioned that he would like a black leather coat. What he should have said was that he wanted a black leather jacket like the one Sylvester Stallone wore in Rocky. So Christmas Day came and dad came over with shopping bags of beautifully wrapped gifts and among them a very large package for Adam. He was so excited to see Adam’s reaction. Adam unwrapped a full length black leather trench coat. Of course he appreciated dad’s generosity and thoughtfulness nonetheless. And Dad just about always got it right. Dad’s Christmas Eve fine tuning lunches were a novel idea. He and a close knit group of men whose wives were equally close would eat at the Prime Rib and discuss what they were giving their wives and that way they could still head out for one last shopping trip to fine tune should they feel the need.
My father was generous with strangers, too. One time on vacation he picked up the bill for a sweet young married couple we met while sharing a table at a Japanese steak house. The husband had just returned from a deployment in Iraq and dad wanted to show his appreciation for his service.
Even our dog got in on the action. Dad liked to take our Siberian Husky, Spike, on long walks at the park followed by hamburgers at McDonalds. He would always feed Spike his in a way that Spike had to take one small bite at a time so he would savor and enjoy it.
Dad was a fan of Stephen Hawking and was fascinated with the moon and stars. In fact, our last daddy/daughter outing before my wedding was a drive out to the country to watch a meteor shower.
He loved swimming and floating in the ocean, he loved cooking and especially French cuisine, he loved Dartmouth, his fraternity brothers from Alpha Delta Phi (where he was called Coyote). He enjoyed carpentry, all the latest gadgets beginning back in the 70’s with his CB radio. Mom’s handle was Orphan Annie and his was Coyote, of course.
He loved and adored my mom who he affectionately called Annie and my brother and me he liked to call James Boy and Amy Girl. He loved his six grandchildren and steadfastly attended and supported their endeavors. They made him beam with pride. He loved his close friends from Lake Barcroft and Sleepy Hollow Bath & Racquet Club. They are like family to us.
He was very proud of his career working both at Treasury and Coopers & Lybrand. He wasn’t thrilled with the new name when it merged. He said it was named Pricewaterhouse Coopers but the Coopers was silent.
He loved to play tennis and did play every Tuesday night until he was limited in recent years.
He was the smartest person I ever met. His close friend and colleague, Ned, once told me that my father had an uncanny ability to recognize a person’s individual strengths and let them run with it.
Dad believed anything was possible. He even told me a story about a dream he had where he was diving in the Olympic Games on a 10 meter platform. I found this fascinating, of course, and I asked him what age he was in his dream. He said his current age, 52. I asked, ‘Did you wear a speedo?” He said yup! But the strange thing was that you had to take an elevator to the top of the platform and they made you slide out to the end of the tower on your belly.” And that’s where the dream ends. Or at least that’s what he told me.
He encouraged me to try things that I didn’t realize I was capable of doing. He’s the reason I became a Division 1 collegiate athlete when I didn’t think I’d be good enough and he’s also the reason I was a collegiate Coach when I didn’t think I was experienced enough.
He was wise. He was witty. He was loving and loyal. I am forever grateful that he was my father. He gave me a very happy life. Rest In Peace Dad.
My Dad
by James Wilkins 2020
When I first thought about what to write for this occasion a line from a song came to mind.
“When my father died it was like a whole library burned down.”
Dad was like a library because, he knew at least a little bit about a lot of things and a lot about plenty of things, too. He had friends from a lot of different areas that might have known only a sliver of his interests, so I’m going to tell you about a few areas I know.
Dad joined ROTC at Dartmouth. He was asked what role he wanted when he joined. He saw the others gathered there and saw most of them lugging big heavy rifles. He decided right away that he didn’t want to be stuck doing that so he said he wanted to be in the ROTC band. They answered, “Great. What do you play?” He looked at the band and pointed at someone with a baritone. So he was assigned baritone in the ROTC band. But he had never played a baritone before. He spent a few minutes with the strange instrument until he was proficient enough to play it in a college band. One of the books in Dad’s library was the ability to pick up an instrument and play it. He did the same thing when I was learning trombone. He could hear a tune and pretty faithfully reproduce it on piano despite having minimal lessons as a kid. I believe he lent out this book to his grandson Matthew, who has a real ear and talent for music.
In his last weeks, we heard from so many people Dad worked with that all wanted to say how much he meant to them. There are many from Treasury and Coopers & Lybrand that have credited Dad with being an important mentor. I’m sure Dad’s library contained books not only about tax policy and transfer pricing but also mentoring, looking out for co-workers, and leading by example. The latter books are probably the most import ones given out to Dad’s work friends.
Back in the day, Dad was an avid sportsman. When he went to college his parents made him promise that he would not try out for the football team as they were afraid he’d be hurt. So, he didn’t. He played rugby instead. And soccer. Dad didn’t do sports halfway. He literally got his teeth kicked out playing goal keeper. He was an avid tennis player into his 70s. He was the kind of person who could get a boomerang to come back on the first try (true story). He was one of those people who were pretty good at a sport the first time they tried it. I think it’s a combination of not being afraid to put yourself out there and having as much fun as possible at the same time. Adam and his son John have this book out on loan.
Dad was a talented artist. He really didn’t give himself many opportunities to make art but he would often find time while helping someone else with an art project. When I had to make an oil painting in school, he bought two canvases – one for each of us. He did his oil still-life while we weren’t watching. Mom and Dad praised my fairly odd-looking portrait of a pilgrim (oil is still not my medium) while Dad’s untrained but really gorgeous still life was tucked away in his closet. This is a book he’s lent to many including his grandsons Peter and Berkeley.
Dad was quite a chef. Mom claims she knew how to make a handful of dishes when they got married. I’m not sure I believe her but I do know Dad really enjoyed eating out at nice places and then figuring out how the dishes he saw were made. He would go home and re-create the parts he liked and invented ways to make them better. He came up with so many dishes that are now family traditions. I know she doesn’t think she’s very creative but he lent this book out to my wife, Kim.
When we found out my son, Berkeley, had an eye disease Dad quickly became an expert in retina diseases. While Kim and I were still in shock, Dad had already identified the best surgeon to treat Berke. Likewise, when my nephew Peter was sick I saw evidence of this book in my sister, Amy. She quickly became an authority on Peter’s treatment. She turned the same attention toward Dad’s disease in the last couple of years when it started to get worse. She was tireless in finding out more about how to help him. Most of all, she had a nearly endless series of questions for doctors, therapists and nurses – all relevant, all incisive. The ability to quickly make yourself enough of an authority on a complex topic, and – more importantly – really caring about the outcome, was a book Dad lent to Amy.
Despite his seriousness about getting work done, Dad was not always a serious person. At least once, when Amy and I were kids, Dad showed up for breakfast naked. Just walked in like nothing was different and plopped himself down in his seat at the breakfast table. Of course, he did this to get a reaction from Mom, and it worked. He appreciated good humor, goofy situations, funny choices. We watched a lot of Benny Hill, Monty Python, Steven Wright, Emo Philips, and Steve Martin together. Sometimes it was better to do something unexpected, original, and not be afraid to look silly if the punchline was worth it. I think this is a book he lent me, and I’ve lent my son Quincy, in turn.
Dad was kind. He was even kind to people he didn’t agree with. He was always appreciative of what he had and any gift he was given. I didn’t always recognize this growing up because it seemed to come so naturally. One Christmas, when my daughter Paisley was very young, she opened one mundane gift after another: socks, a book, gloves. And with each gift she exclaimed how much she loved each one, remarking on the book cover, trying on the sweater, saying what matched this new winter hat. Kim looked at me like this was not normal and said, “This must be a Wilkins thing.” Yes, Kim, this was a book Paisley got from Dad.
So I think there are two main lessons from the life of John Wilkins.
First: Put yourself out there in the world. Don’t be afraid to try something different, learn a new skill – even if it means you might have to fake it for a while. Everyone who is an expert in every field of knowledge once knew absolutely nothing about that field. Isn’t it nice to know that? We all start at the same place.
Second: Be generous with your gifts. If you have time, spend it with someone who could use it. If you have money, share. If you have knowledge, lend it out to the people you meet like books from a library.
When my father died it was like a whole library burned down. But it didn’t matter. All the books were lent out to all of us. The library is gone but we, the lucky ones who were blessed by knowing John Wilkins, have the books that made up the library.
