Lake County is two giants fewer today
and that makes our tight-knit community a much sadder place to be
this day.
It is very unlikely that Hugh D.
Pallister Jr. and Rudy V. Veselko Sr. ever bumped into each other,
let alone were poker-playing buddies.
Yet both men left a valued footprint in
the history of Lake County, for rather different reasons.
On second thought, maybe there just
happens to be a common thread in an environmental sort of way.
The obituaries of the 100-year-old
Pallister is laid out one space away from that of the 92-year-old
Veselko in today's News-Herald, these giants passing on two days
apart.
Their short obit narratives do neither
man justice, however.
Right up front let us pay tribute to
the fact that both men were World War II veterans; Pallister as an
Army officer and Veselko as a Marine.
Diverging, Pallister was both an
accomplished public servant and an ardent supporter of protecting
Lake County's open space.
Pallister served for 24 years as a
councilman for his adopted hometown of Willoughby. In 1984 the city
even bestowed the honor of “Distinguished Citizen of the Year” on
Pallister.
For those of us in the arena of
conservation, the environment or whatever you want to call it,
Pallister was an active participant and leader in the protection of
Lake County's natural resources.
The list of environmental agencies,
organizations and affiliations centered around Pallister's outdoors
world are almost too many to number.
Even so we will name a few, among them
being Lake Metroparks, the Burrough's Nature Club, the Cleveland
Museum of Natural History, and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy.
And whenever I saw Pallister he
virtually always was with his muse; wife Gretta.
Together this two-for-one environmental
dynamo was a force for good to be reckoned with as they worked to
secure for future generations such threatened Lake County properties
as Gully Brook in Willoughby-Willoughby Hills.
When that jewel was installed in Lake
Metroparks' crown, in some not-so-inconsequential way it was due to
the efforts of Hugh and Gretta who saw to it that the stone would be
purchased and then polished to its present high luster.
At all times, too, Hugh was of the old
school; polite and mannerly almost to a fault.
Kindly to those whom he met, Hugh also
was always amply pleasant whenever he answered my telephone calls
seeking his or Gretta's thoughts on this or that Lake County
environmental matter.
Others believe the same way as well.
Bob Riggin, former Willoughby
councilman who served with Pallister for a couple of terms, says he
lost both a fellow former public servant and more importantly, a good
friend.
“Hugh was a great guy, very
conscientious with a real concern for Willoughby as well as being
equally well involved with the Chamber of Commerce,” Riggin said.
Riggin said he also worked closely with
Pallister on Lake Metroparks matters. That was when Riggin was a park
board commissioner and Pallister served on this or that agency
advisory committee.
“He did a lot and he accomplished a
lot,” said Riggin.
Yes, he did.
Then again, so did Veselko. In his own
way, that is.
Veselko was the founder of the
now-closed Veselko's Greenhouse in Mentor.
Though I willingly admit that Veselko
hardly could be called an associate let alone a friend, I did see his
greenhouse business as central Lake County's go-to home vegetable
plant and flower bed gardening store.
Then again, so did a lot of other urban
backyard farmers, such as my late fishing companion, Dean Palmer of
Willoughby Hills.
That I came to learn by reading
Veselko's obit that he was one of Lake County's first bedding plant
specialist was one of those “uh-huh” movements. While it was a
detail unfamiliar to me the fact didn't overwhelm me as being
unthinkable.
Veselko knew his stuff about plants
Which helps explain why from late April
through May Veselko's Greenhouse was alive with customer activity. We
would cruise the shop's isles, depending upon the sunlight filtering
through the greenhouse's somewhat dingy glass in order to see what we
wanted to purchase.
And as often as not for me that meant
experimenting with some of the many varieties of tomato plants
Veselko's seemed to stock.
Sure as rain, too, early in each
planting season I'd inquire about buying such plant stock as beans or
whatever, only to be gruffly rebuked by Veselko that I was too quick
to ask for a vegetable that wouldn't be ready for a few more weeks.
Yet every pre-growing season I'd carry
to the car my mush-mash of tomato and pepper varieties, knowing that
the bank account was a tad slimmer and my behind a smidgen chewed out
for asking so very obviously a dumb gardening question.
No matter, as I'd return the following
spring to go at it again with Veselko and his hardy veggie plant
factory.
And so Lake County has seen the passing
of two divergent individuals, each a World War II veteran and both
men of high caliber in their own respective and unique way.
Thank you, gentlemen, you helped
transform Lake County into a better place by being giants among us.
- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn
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