The gift of a father: ‘I will be forever grateful to God who gave him to me’

One of Irene Evans’ favorite family photos captures her and her father Frank Wojtanowski sharing a birthday celebration together. (Submitted photo)

(Editor’s note: The Criterion has invited our readers to share their stories about how their father’s influence has shaped their life and their faith. Here is one of their stories.)
 

By John Shaughnessy

One in an occasional series

In our childhoods, our fathers are often our heroes, the people we aspire to be one day.

As we grow older, some of us can look down on the person we once looked up to—at least before another change in perspective happens.

Mark Twain captured that changing perspective perfectly when the great American author noted, “When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.”

Irene Evans is one of the fortunate people who never went through those times of changing perspectives. As one of the four daughters of her late father, Frank Wojtanowski, her view of him as her hero has never changed.

“He seemed bigger than life to me, yet he stood only 5 feet, 9 inches tall,” says Evans, a member of St. Monica Parish in Indianapolis. “He was strong, an amateur boxer in his early life who taught us a few boxing moves. To this day, I know how to do a headlock. My father was a protector.

“Losing his mother to a heart condition when he was only 10 profoundly affected my father. But it didn’t harden him. Instead, throughout his life, he celebrated each new child born into our large extended family as hope for the future. And he was asked to be a godfather to so many I’ve lost count of them all. My father was a champion for life.”

Her memories of him also include his love for his wife, Evans’ mother.

“When freshly out of the Navy in World War II, he met my mother on a blind date and never looked back,” Evans says. “He described it as love at first sight when she answered the door to her parent’s modest home. My father became a faithful and loving husband.”

Her view of him as a hero also extends to his service to his country during World War II.

“One of my very first memories with my father is sitting in a theater watching the movie, Wing and a Prayer,” she recalls. “The movie features life and actual battle scenes on the USS Yorktown, the Navy aircraft carrier that my father served on. He was a gunner in the planes that flew many nighttime missions in key victories in the South Pacific.

“As I watched the movie, I struggled to see over the seat in front of me. I remember stretching up my young self as high as I could without leaving my seat as my father said several times, ‘Look! There I am.’ Whether or not it was actually him, I’m not sure, but I believed it was, and I was so proud.”

Evans says it was one of the rare times he talked about his service to his country, noting that “his medals were discreetly locked away.” He showed that same humility in his later life.

“Whenever he was recognized for his volunteer work as a prime member of our church’s Dad’s Club, or for being the bingo number caller, or for the fact that he worked three jobs at times to support his family, he shied away from praise.”

Instead, he focused on his faith daily.

“It is with great love and tenderness that I remember this humble man who knelt every night saying the rosary that otherwise hung on his bedpost,” Evans notes. “Later in his retirement home, he led the rosary for those who joined him each week.”

All these qualities add up to her image of her father as her hero.

“Was he an inspiration? Did he teach me to love? To serve? Did he model his deep and abiding faith? The love of our country? Yes, yes. A thousand times yes.

“I will be forever grateful to God who gave him to me as my father.” †