John J. Jack Gargan - Growing Up Fast, Poor, Cold, and Hungry

John j. Jack Gargan

He Who Climbs a Tree and Hollers

A RAGAMUFFINS QUEST FOR SUCCESS AND LOVE

PROLOGUE

He Who Climbs A Tree And Hollers

T his is a chronicle of the life of one John J. Jack Gargan. The J. stands for Joseph and I also have a Confirmation name of James. When I was Confirmed at age eight or so, I took the given name of my younger brother, James, better known as Jim. We were very close then and remained so until his death. During his early years, we all called him Jimmie, a name I still frequently refer to him by. Sadly, Jim passed away in 2004 at age 72, the victim of a too-late-diagnosed colon cancer. I miss him. I also have an older sister, Frances Dolly (she prefers to be called Franny) and an adopted little sister, Catherine (she preferred to be called Cathy) who is seventeen years my junior and passed away, another victim of cancer, a few years ago. Actually, she was my cousin, the daughter of my mothers half-brother, Joe. Mom and my step-father, Siegfried Steve Beck, adopted and raised her from the time she was an infant. In fact, brought her home from the birthing hospital and her first crib was a dresser drawer with a pillow and a baby blanket in it.

When I was baptized my grandmother insisted that I be named Aloysius, my fathers middle name (also Saint Aloysius, one of her favorite saints). My mother, years later, told me about that battle of wills. It seems she and my grandma never did see eye to eye on many aspects of child rearing, especially mine. Mom said She would be damned if she would tag a life-sentence moniker like that on any of her children and refused to give in to Grandmas harangue. Thanks, Mom! I have been eternally grateful. Saint Aloysius may have been quite a guy in his day, but in todays world, with a name like Aloysius Gargan I think I would have been doomed to a life of ridicule and failure. I can just hear my peers tauntingly sing-songing, Allo-wishes do the dishes.

For some time now, years actually, I have been meaning to write my life story. I have even been urged to do it by a number of friends and acquaintances who were aware of, and sometimes part of this fascinating life I have been blessed to live. Finally, after a triple bypass, two stents and an angioplasty, a defibrillator pacemaker and at the outer limits of life expectancy, I have decided to quit procrastinating and get this thing on paper while I am still here to do it and have all my marbles and sharp memory to record it properly. It is now 2014 as I start writing this story. I will add to it from time to time. It helps that I am now retired and living in Thailand and have lots of spare time which needs productive utilization while my new young bride teaches World History and Geography at the local high school in Ban Wang Phoem. This is NOT my life story. Although eighty-four years have already passed me by, I still have a lot of living to do! That will have to wait for a later chapter. With such a long and interesting life it looks like it will require more than one book to tell my story.

This first volume will cover the period from my birth up to my first real job upon graduating from high school. It should give a pretty good insight as to what it was like growing up poor during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Strange, how I started life at the beginning of a monstrous financial and economic collapse and it looks like I will leave this old world during its sequel, which I think will be soon and even worse!

The Honest-To-God truth is I have enjoyed my life so much that I would not trade places with anyone in the world, past or present, with the possible exception of my hero, Thomas Jefferson. Although, like most lives, at times mine was not very pleasant. This is not to imply that there may not be a host of others who were also blessed with a great life, but for sheer interest, pleasure, adventure and accomplishments, I dont personally know of anyone who has had better. Certainly not as a boast, but just to highlight points of interest in my life, what other ordinary person do you know who has honorable discharges from both the Army and the Navy; has six published books, including a Book-of-the-Month selection; worked as a dishwasher in a roadhouse and as a pitch-man at a boardwalk concession; can milk a cow (or goat) and plow and harrow with a horse; worked his way through college while sole support of his wife and two children (two more after graduation); was Man of the Year of his college fraternity; was helmsman on a small warship during a fierce Atlantic storm; piloted a plane; worked the cruise lines and luxury resort hotels as a world-class handwriting analyst (commanding fees of $500 per hour plus all expenses back in the 1980s) and is a fair-to-middling artist?

And who else do you know of who ran for Governor of a large state (and, with a war chest of only $68,000,had the third highest vote in a primary field of nine candidates, most of them spending millions), set voting records running for Congress (but still lost!), counts people like Jeb Bush, Donald Trump, Joan Rivers, Ross Perot, Jesse Ventura, Pat Buchanan and John Anderson among his circle of friends and acquaintances, served as adjunct professor of finance for seventeen years and was selected by The Chicago Board of Trade as one of the Outstanding Instructors of Finance in the USA, conceived and ran what has been described as the most successful amateur newspaper ad campaign in US history with 633 full-page ads in practically every major newspaper in the country, kissed the Blarney Stone, was elected National Chairman of a major political party (Reform Party USA), appeared as an invited guest on over a thousand local and national radio and TV shows (including almost all of the biggies like DONOHUE, GOOD MORNING AMERICA, and LARRY KING LIVE), was elected world-wide Chieftain of an Irish clan; was invited to speak at the prestigious Harvard Law School Forum, founded a professional association (IARFC) which has become the largest of its kind in the world, and was named Hero Of The Week by TIME magazine?

Not to mention being subject of full-color, multi-page cover stories in the weekend magazine inserts of U.S.A. TODAY and the ORLANDO SUN, founding the THRO (Throw the Hypocritical Rascals Out) campaign and caused what political analysts have described as the catalyst for a sea-change in American political history; has been acclaimed as The father of the national term limits movement, was selected, along with brother, Jim, as two of the twenty graduates to the Hall of Fame of his high school, has traveled in all 50 states (most several or many times) and visited many countries of the world, was originator and driving force of the Draft Perot for President movement, was host of his own TV talk show, married a beautiful Thai school teacher thirty three years his junior, was recipient of the prestigious Loren Dunton Award (The Heisman trophy of the financial services industry), was invited to the Presidential Palace in Dublin, Ireland to receive the Clans of Ireland Order of Merit, has past or current listings in Marquis WHOs WHO IN AMERICA, WHOS WHO IN THE WORLD, WHOS WHO IN FINANCE AND INDUSTRY. STRATHMERES WHOS WHO and INTERNATIONAL MEN OF ACHIEVEMENT (a British publication)and can document all of the above! All this, and claims descent, with substantial verification, from two Egyptian Pharaohs (Nectonibus and Ahkanaten and his wife, Nefertiti) and a long line of powerful Celtic kings (to say nothing of the Nile River being named for one of his ancestors). Again, I say all this not boastfully, but just as a factual listing of a most interesting and unique life.