Jack Phillips, 84, recounts a reminiscence on the chair swing behind his house in downtown Pierceton. Photo by Ray Balogh.

By Ray Balogh
InkFreeNews

PIERCETON — Jack Phillips spent a recent picture perfect afternoon right where any octogenarian retiree belongs: rocking in a backyard wooden chair swing, surveying the quiet Pierceton neighborhood he has called home for the past 58 years.

At times he is joined by Mary Kate Phillips — “Kate” to everyone who knows her — the girl he married 62 years ago in the church just down the road, or by his daughter Diana Richards, who lives right across the street.

Phillips is glib in recollecting his 84 years on earth. Gladly so, as evidenced by his three-sentence autobiography: “Life has sure been good to me. Thank you, Lord. Count your blessings one by one … .”

But Phillips’s forced retirement after lower back surgery Aug. 30, 2012, has not translated into incessant sedentariness. He still owns 43 acres of land — 12 of them wetland — “outside of town.”

He drives to the acreage every day to maintain the grounds and tend to his 1/2-acre garden, muscling his arsenal of utility vehicles, including a Bobcat, UTV, Kubota tractor, rototiller, plow and disk.

His choice of crops reflects his “goal in life to help people,” as he grows “mainly things to give away.”

The yearly harvest usually includes pumpkins, gourds, tomatoes and “sundance pickles.” He said the pickles are prolific. “Along 20 feet of fence, I can get five to 10 pickles every day all season long.”

His great-great-grandfather lived just outside Etna Green and in 1902 his great-grandpa moved into a log cabin in Catalpa Grove, where the Child Evangelism Ministries now maintains its campus.

His dad, Keith; grandpa Harry O’Dell; and great-grandpa Merritt all worked for the local railroad, a job that cost Harry O’Dell one of his legs.

Phillips started his work career making crankshafts for Homelite chain saws at the Milford Machine Shop in Leesburg. He worked there from 1959 to 1962 and the next year took a job with International Harvester in Fort Wayne, where he worked until the plant moved to Ohio in 1983.

“Then I used my military mountain climbing training (he served in the Army Special Forces between the Korean conflict and Vietnam War) to open up Phillips Tree Service and trim and remove trees.”

He ran that business for three decades until he was permanently sidelined by the surgery.

“I had the good life,” he said. “I worked six months and went fishing in Florida for six months.”

Phillips has a knack for remembering others from distant the past — or making them remember him. He recalled the time he put a dead mouse on the seat of the principal’s secretary during study hall.

“She sat on it and squashed it out this big,” indicating the diameter of a regular pancake.

“About 25 years later I was eating supper with her when she asked if it was me. She had it narrowed down to me and another kid, but I think she knew it was me.

“We had good teachers. I’ll never forget what my math teacher, John Maury, would tell us: ‘The empty boxcar does all the rattling.’”

One of his Phillips’ important life events occurred Aug. 9, 1990, when he was baptized at the First Baptist Church of Pierceton. “I call that pastor every anniversary to thank him.”

Phillips’ two abiding passions are collecting Native American artifacts and photos of Pierceton. He has also dabbled in coin collecting.

His collection of 1,000 photographs dates back to the early 1900s.

“I had a big glass negative of the school when it burned in 1928. I have pictures of the school burning, the tomato factory, wagon factory and most of the 12 or so schools in Washington Township. I have photos of buildings long gone, like the livery stable where the bank is now.”

He owns a group photo of a picnic in 1932 and has identified 180 of the 215 persons in the picture. “A computer will help you with facial recognition,” he said, until he hopefully identifies every last person in the photo.

For 25 years Phillips also served his community with the town’s EMS and fire department, serving a stint as assistant fire chief.