Epilogue
Bucky
Bucky and several of his friends enlisted in the Navy while they were seniors in high school. They were to be trained as radio technicians, and would not be called up until they finished high school. Bucky was called in September 1944 and that was essentially when he left Gorham St. He was sent to training schools in Indiana, California and Washington, DC. While he was in Washington the war in Europe ended and the war in the Pacific also ended. Bucky was given the option of remaining at the Washington school, or being sent oversees as a replacement. He chose being sent oversees as a replacement, was eventually assigned to an admiral's staff and was responsible for repairing the typewriters used by the radiomen on the ship, and also for filing the admiral's general messages. He returned home to Gorham St in late July, 1946. In September 1946 he enrolled in an emergency college New York State set up at the abandoned Sampson Naval Training Base. From then until 1951 Bucky was at school or working during vacations. In 1947 when Et and Ed bought their house on Laurelton Rd there was a room for him, and he no longer used Gorham St as his home address.
After one year at Sampson, he enrolled at the University of Wyoming in Laramie where he received his BS in physics. From there he went to the University of Michigan and graduated in January 1951 with an MS in mathematics with a major in statistics. He almost immediately accepted a position as an operations analyst with Bell Aircraft in Buffalo. (His first day of work there was Valentine's Day, 1951. Unforgettable.) After 5 years with Bell Aircraft he moved to Washington to work with a non-profit company doing consulting work for the department of defense
This non-profit company was wholly owned by the commercial airlines. A benefit of working there was that employees were entitled to passes on the just about all of the major airlines. As a result Bucky made trips around the US, to Europe, to Asia and Australia, and to Africa. Leaving that firm was difficult to do. (Playing golf on some of those beautiful courses in California, Florida, and Jamaica was very, very pleasant.) The benefits certainly were difficult to give up, but it was more difficult leaving the talented people he had been working with.
For the remainder of his career Bucky worked with small firms in the Washington area. These small firms, all working for the government, mainly the defense department, were known as "Beltway Bandits." The work involved reviewing and writing requirements for new military systems, and designing test programs to evaluate their effectiveness.
In 1988 a small program Bucky was working on was cancelled by the Navy. There was no back-up work in the firm, and when he told them he'd be leaving, they said they were "sorry, but things are tough." So Bucky retired in 1988 at age 62. In truth, he was tired of the work he had been doing for 37 years.
In December of 1978 Bucky suffered a heart attack. He recovered from that and resumed a normal and more healthy life style. In May of 1979 he had an operation for an enlarged prostate.
In retirement Bucky volunteered at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum and delivered meals-on-wheels. He also accompanied Et and Ed on several of their Elder hostels in this country. He started attending musical performances with greater regularity. He took courses in a wide range of subjects, from the US Supreme Court to James Joyce's "Ulysses". And he continues to do that.
The highlight of his retirement was the time he spent working with Lou and Et in preparing "Growing Up in Rochester with Sam and Ida Rappaport". Each of us enjoyed working on it, and it was a pleasure working with Lou and Et as we were reminded of events on Gorham St.
