The Grouchiest of Grandpas
Tough and Easy Stages

By John McCabe

Most of us regard our grandfathers as deeply pleasant, lovable older gentlemen. I loved mine but I knew he was different from traditional grandpas somehow. I sensed that it had something to do with his ferocious temper which was an elemental part of him, a vital part of him, to the very hour he died.

He began life in conventional, even traditional fashion, for a man of his century.

His parents left Ireland as so many did during the 19th Century because Ireland was almost dead in respect to life opportunity, and they came to the United States because it was just the opposite. His father found work on the Erie Canal, and in several senses drifted to the American Midwest, settling down in Jackson, Michigan. Here my grandfather, christened John Charles McCabe, spent his boyhood. It was almost Lincolnesque in tone because he was expected to cut wood, haul water, and do other tasks to help supplement the amenities of his parents’ rather spartan household. He even milked their single cow.

As for schooling, that was left to young John’s choice. His father was uneducated, but insisted the boy at least finish grade school. As to anything beyond that, his father told him, he would have to decide for himself. So Grandpa went to St. John’s School in Jackson where he became a reluctant scholar at best. He settled down to look at life from the perspective of a time-bound student. He didn’t like it.

Whether it was the vocal drone of a boring teacher, or the loveliness of a certain May morning beckoning him elsewhere, he never gave a reason for what he did one day in class. He was certainly listening to a teacher, when a sudden urge seized Grandpa. He looked away from the teacher, glanced out a large window next to his desk, and without understanding why he did it, walked to the window, opened it all the way, and jumped out to the lawn below.

He never entered another classroom for the rest of his life. He was then 14. Yet within thirty years that same unschooled lad was to become Chief Engineer for the City of Detroit.

He certainly didn’t attain that eminence with the aid of an ingratiating temperament because he had little of that. His temper tended towards the explosive, and he did not spare it when he thought it was needed. Or not needed. In the days when telephone connection was made through young females known as “operators,” Grandpa one day could not reach a certain number. The operator just did not seem to know her job. Grandpa cursed her, he pulled the entire instrument from the wall, and hurled it to the floor.

His mother, a very gentle lady, sitting nearby, merely looked at him, saying nothing. Shame faced, keenly now aware of his perfidy, Grandpa saw to it that the telephone was quickly replaced. More, he sought out and finally discovered the identity of the telephone operator he had verbally mistreated. Thus began a friendship between them and two years later that operator, a Miss Josephine Donaho of Wyandotte, Michigan, became Mrs. John C. McCabe.

She, like her mother-in-law was a tiny, exquisitely beautiful lady who could control Grandpa’s titanic rages by simply giving him a look. A simple look and he would cease roaring at once.

How did this temperamental lion who finished his schooling at 14 ever become Chief Engineer for the City of Detroit? My dad (also an engineer) said, “He became a great engineer by learning what engines did by taking them apart piece by piece and reassembling them piece by piece. He was a prodigious reader of technical manuals and verified their contents unendingly. He created his own machine shop in the garage, inventing little items for his family’s comfort. No college degree, but he didn’t need one because he knew so much. He became Chief Engineer by written test. No one came near to his score.”

My younger brother, Bud, and I grew up in loving awe of Grandpa. He was grouchy but somehow sweet. One thing did disturb us about him as we grew older. Grandpa claimed to know Henry Ford. Not only knew him but knew him well. This somehow had the ring of bragadoccio.

It seemed that everybody in Detroit’s middle class those years knew someone who actually ‘knew’ Henry Ford. But no one spoke of him as a personal friend, as Grandpa did. Bud and I were afraid that Grandpa in this instance could be an actual liar.

At one of the annual motor shows of the 30s when all the Detroit automakers displayed their wares at Convention Hall on Cass Avenue, Grandpa took Bud and me to look at that year’s best. We delighted in all there was to see. Then at one end of the long hall, a crowd began to gather. The buzz spread through the hall: “Henry Ford. Himself. He’s here.”

And so he was. In person, at the Ford Exhibit. Grandpa said to us, “My God, Henry! I haven’t seen him for years.” Bud and I felt sick to the soul in anticipatory embarrassment. Forthwith, Grandpa took us boys over to the large crowd surrounding Mr. Ford, Grandpa shouldered his way through the crowd, promptly tapped Ford on the shoulder. Ford spun around, squinted at Grandpa, and then almost shouted, John, you old rogue. It’s been over 30 years!” And so it had. Grandpa had worked for Ford in the days when they were both employed by the then Edison Illuminating Company of Detroit. Ford was chief engineer of its power plant, and Grandpa was one of his assistants. “Boys,” said Mr. Ford to Bud and me after we had been properly introduced, “You’ll never know what a funny old fellow your grandfather is.”

Well, yes. Yes, we did.

Dr. John McCabe, year-around resident of Mackinac Island, has for decades been professional actor, drama professor, and show business biographer. The Town Crier has asked him to share, from time to time, some of his memories.