55 Death of my Dad, Louis Frederick Bein Jr.
My dad died in the same Berthoud, Colorado bedroom where he was born. I was with him at the second of these two events. He had been going for some time experiencing different forms of cancer when he managed to come visit me and the children in Indianapolis on December 1990. He was concerned that I was struggling as a single parent and wanted to get a last visit with us. This was a month before his death on January 10, 1991. During the three days he was with us he seemed quite mobile but must have been taking large doses of pain killers. Although he knew his time was limited, he gave me his last mission of service before he was taken into the hospital unit back in Colorado. I was grateful for his visit.
It was January 9th when I received a call telling me of Dad’s pending death and that I should come immediately. I found someone to stay with the children for a few days and flew out to Colorado. I was met at the Denver airport and driven directly to the hospital in Loveland. Dad wanted me there but was unconsciously waiting for me and was being kept alive with intravenous tubes and oxygen. As I arrived, he was unhooked from his tubes and packed in a hearse. I rode with him back to the Berthoud house.
At the family home, two of the ambulance men carried him into the house and up the stairs to his bedroom. They accidently dropped him while going up the stairs when he let out a loud groan, letting me know that he was still alive for the moment. Once we were on the 2nd floor they placed him in his bed.
I was not exactly sure about the seriousness of the situation for what was supposed to happen next. My mother and my siblings went downstairs while I remained with Dad. A man from hospice arrived and sat with us. I felt somewhat invaded by the hospice fellow and I kept waiting for him to leave us. At one point I realized that Dad was “going,” and I had better say what I needed. He was breathing heavily and seemed urgent. I placed my hand on his chest and told him that I loved him. The hospice person left at that point and I felt one with Dad and relished the moment alone with him.
Dad continued breathing, but loudly (I learned later that this was called railing) and suddenly he stopped breathing altogether. In this silence, I shook him gently trying to wake him. I realized that this was the moment of his passing. I sensed his out of body presence a few feet away, looking down on me and his body. I sensed what he was thinking “What the hell is this? I am supposed to be dead!” I looked up at that spot and called out to him.
“Dad, this is your time: go to the light.” It seemed that was what he did, as his essence was no longer in the room.
At the funeral service a few days later, his casket remained closed. There must have been several hundred people in the large room, many whom I knew from childhood. At one point people were asked to share their memories of my father. I also took my turn.
“Dad, I wish to express my gratitude for raising me as an honest, hardworking individual” I related how he challenged me to excel and encouraged me to be who I wanted to be. Although he would have liked me to follow in his footsteps and take over the family business, he honored my hard work and initiative to become a professor.
I told the story of the time he and my 14-year-old self were vaccinating 30-pound lambs for “sore mouth” disease. I grabbed the large lambs and sat them up so he could inject a dose of serum into their armpits. This went on for some time and after 40 or so lambs, I was getting tired. Dad decided we needed to switch roles for a while. It took some doing on my part to learn how to get the injection needle inserted correctly and the serum released. About the time I had it together and was getting used to the process, the lamb that Dad was holding jerked loose from his hands and dose intended for the lamb went into Dad’s hand.
I won’t you tell the exact words he said to me, but I will tell you that he never did catch “sore mouth”!
Once when is was about 15, Ralph Dean came by the house, and apparently had a beef with Dad. What the issue was I don’t know, but voices were raised, and Ralph hauled off and hit Dad in the mouth. Dad tied in to him and wrestled him to the ground. Dad sat on Ralph’s stomach until he calmed down. Some how the word got-out about the scuffle. The adult men kept coming up to me to hear the nitty gritty. I felt a bit like a celebrity.
Gramma Bein told me about Dad growing up. She related an event when he was about seven. It was a very cold day in January and from his bedroom he noticed a flock of shivering blue birds in a nearby tree. He went and got a long plank, covered it with bird seed and extended it out of the window several feet. Dad left the room so as not to scare the blue birds who were ecstatically enjoyed the food and the continued on into the warm room.
After about an hour Gramma heard some strange sounds coming out his room. Opening the door she was amazed to find a flock of birds perched all over the drapery, bed and chairs. The frightened blue birds all flew out and she cleaned the mess they had made, but never told my grandfather about it.
Dad with sister Jane on his horse. Photo by Ellen B. Bein 1929
She also related when my dad was a teenager he would ride his horse up into the foothills of the Rockies and be gone all day. I thought later that was how Dad found peace and solitude away from his abusive father. I have heard that horses bond with humans and possess a psychological healing power.
Interesting enough, he decided that we needed horses while we were growing up. His Wyoming cattle rancher friends offered their worn out cutting horses as good “kid horses”. He did know about the bonding power horses have with humans, but he sensed the nurturing that he received and decided it was good for us to be around horses.
When I was 7, Dad decided to change my name from Louis Frederick Bein III to Frederick Louis Bein. He wanted me to have my own identity not weighted down with the stigma of my unpopular Grandfather which he had to endure. It did not make any difference to me since I was still known as Ricky taken from the last part of Frederick.
He did not know how to express his feelings, but through his goodness it was evident that he was a loving man. He was hard on us as a few spankings brought us into line while he encouraged us to aspire to higher things. Those things we did, thanks to him.
Dad loved to entertain us children after dinner by sliding his chair back from the table and load up his lap with 3 or 4 kids and began sing old ditty’s that he had learned somewhere. As he sang, he would keep time to the music by bouncing his feet up and down. I remember most of those songs, and I do remember the raucous singing and bouncing.
When I was in 5th grade, I asked Dad for a bicycle. His answer was “You got a horse.” So, I rode the horse to school and tied him up to the bicycle rack. The horse was quite a sensation with the other kids, but not with the principal who was not pleased with the fresh pile road apples left behind. Soon after that Dad got me a bike.
When I turned 16, I wanted a car like my colleagues in High School. “You can ride the school bus.” These were some very practical solutions but at the time, I felt slighted. There was a lot of learning that I got from this experience.
I learned later about Dad’s experience with agriculture. Although my grandfather had acquired a number farms from bank for-closures during the Great Depression of the 1930s, Dad never engaged in the actual farming until he returned home from service with the US Navy in 1945. My grandfather assigned him to one of the farms when suddenly he was forced to learn the mechanics of farming. Dad launched himself into a major self education effort, learning from other farmers as well as meeting with professors from the Department of Agriculture at Colorado State University. He began applying what he learned and when I became old enough to following him around, he implanted his learning process by sharing with me much of the mechanics of farming. I began taking on small farm chores at quite and early age.
I went through some major changes with my experience in the Peace Corps where I picked up a lot of Latin culture from the Brazilians. Arriving home, Dad met me at the airport I freaked him out when I pushed aside his outstretched hand and grabbed him with a big bear hug. I could see his homo-phobic buttons being pushed. Reading his mind, I could sense that he was thinking “What did they do to you down there boy?” But I kept hugging him whenever I greeted him. He began to look forward to my hugs and he even began to initiate them. Also my siblings began experiencing his more demonstrative approach. I can brag that I taught Dad how to hug.
Mom and Dad at their wedding in 1942
My dad now lies with my mom, who followed him ten years later, in the Berthoud Cemetery in Colorado.
