The Quiet Man's Commencement Speech

Two years ago, I had this idea that everyone has a commencement speech to give. Everyone has lessons to share, stories to tell, advice to give -- if only someone asks.

It's an idea that returns to my mind every spring as graduates roll across stages, "Pomp and Circumstance" plays in your head, and the "best" commencement speeches flood social media.

My first try at this topic was with my mother in 2014. An ordinary woman by many standard measures, but an extraordinary woman by my standards.  You can read about her commencement advice here.

A Reluctant Speaker

This year, I decided to return to this topic. Naturally, I called on my father. The other half of my wise parenting duo. He wasn't enthusiastic about the idea. "I hoped you had forgotten," he said when I showed up at his house with my pen and pad ready for his interview.

My dad is a man of few words. He's a quiet man. Some of that might be because he has spent more than 50 years of his life competing with my chatty mom for an audience or "air-time." Some of it might just be his nature -- introverted and humble.

If you've never interviewed your parents, I highly recommend it. In my line of work, I've interviewed CEOs, scientists, business people, historians, etc., and my approach is always to be prepared with questions, but to probe and follow-up looking for the "story" or the color. It's a totally different dynamic and you learn things about their lives and their thinking that you may have never  have known before.

A Stable Boy and Soda Jerk from Jersey City 

My father has lived quite an interesting life over his 75 years. He has seen some amazing things and earned a great life with hard work. He could certainly teach some life lessons to this year's class of graduates.

My father grew up in Jersey City. His father was  a Scottish immigrant from Edinburgh, a tradesman. His mother was a Jersey City girl who worked for the phone company. I think he inherited his work ethic, quiet demeanor and handy-man qualities from his working class parents.

When you ask my father about his youth, the answers come slowly. It's like he is thoughtfully walking down a hall in his mind slowly remembering different people and moments. He opens and closes doors, and only tells you bits and pieces. He is still skeptical about the point to all of this.

I find out that when he was 15 years old, he  ran a stable in Jersey City  for a collection of horse owners. What? I can't fathom horse stables in the Jersey City where I grew up, but it existed down where Country Village is today and people rode in the parks and on some trails. The owners paid my father about $5 a week to clean, feed and care for the horses.  He tells me a bit about "Sarge," a tall black gelding jumper that he really liked.
 
That was his morning work. After school in the afternoons, he worked the counter at Pete & Henry's shop on the corner of Cator and Fowler Avenues (two blocks from where he lives today). He was a "soda jerk" as they called them in those days, making malteds and egg creams for the regulars. When I asked, he could still describe how he made the best egg cream in town (see classic recipe here). I learn that my father was an original "barista" mastering froth long before Starbucks.

And then on the weekends, he had yet another job, washing cars and pumping gas at Ed's service station. Horses, egg creams and cars. What else could a teenaged boy in Jersey City desire?

My quiet father doesn't really offer any great wisdom for graduates from this period of his life, but I think it tells its own message about the value of a strong work ethic.

Working in the Hallowed Halls of Bell Labs

In between these jobs, my father graduated from Snyder High School, where he specialized in Industrial Arts. He got his first job at AT&T Bell Labs and worked for a year in one of their electrical shops making coils for new phone prototypes and equipment. Then, he joined the U.S. Air Force.

He saw the world (San Antonio, Tex.., Wichita Falls, Ks., and Mt, Hebo, Oregon!!) and learned another trade -- air conditioning and cooling systems. As a kid, I never rally understood the A/C system and Air Force connection. Was my father the Maytag man for the military? No, my father explained that they needed major A/C systems to keep all the advanced radar equipment cool at the station in Oregon. They were keeping an eye on our neighbors in the Soviet Union and on the lookout for Russian aircraft.

After four years my father returned home to Jersey City to marry my mother. He went back to AT&T Bell Labs and worked there for 36 years.

The transistor was invented at Bell Labs in 1947,
one of the hallmark breakthroughs of this invention factory

My father beams with pride -- as much as this stoic man beams at all -- when he talks about "the Labs." He started out as a union member (AFL-CIO) and worked as a mechanic in various shops. It was an exciting era for Bell Labs and telecommunications. My father shared the halls and cafeteria with brilliant people who invented the transistor, discovered the Big Bang Theory and launched the first Telstar satellite.(Read a history of Bell Labs inventions here). 


He took great pride in being part of such a forward-looking place that was shaping technology and society. Some of the prototypes and materials he worked on became parts of the miniaturized circuit boards that would end up in the first telecommunication satellites circling the earth, the first Picture Phone (40 years before FaceTime) and the lasers that became the foundation of today's fiber optic networks.

Bell Labs was a special place and my father felt special for working there. His career progressed over the years into management jobs, overseeing the mailroom and loading dock operations as well as semiconductor clean rooms. He enjoyed supervising teams. "I always tried to treat them they way I wanted to be treated," he said. "It was always about getting the job done right."

I hear him talk about his time there and the lesson I take away for graduates is to pick a workplace, a company and a job you can be proud of. Be part of making a difference in the world. Understand and appreciate how your role -- whether it's fabricating silicon chips or delivering the mail -- is part of a bigger picture. Enjoy being part of something bigger than yourself that can change the world.

Times Change, But Don't be Afraid

In 1994, times were changing. AT&T, the former Ma Bell monopoly, was still trying to compete on a global stage and the old "contract for life" mentality was being tattered there and across Corporate America. My father, "the company man," essentially worked himself out of a  job and got a harsh dose of reality that many in his generation didn't see coming. He was "downsized" by AT&T after 36 years. "I didn't expect it," he said.  He would go onto work at Essex County College for another nine years, but leaving his home at Bell Labs was not easy.

When I asked my father what he would want to instill in graduates, the first thing he said was "Don't be afraid of change." This surprised me given the fact he spent half his life with one company. He talked about the changes he faced going from union jobs to management ranks at AT&T and other moments in his career. "Change is always challenging, but it taught me about different things that I enjoyed doing. Don't second guess yourself."

Education also means a great deal to my father, who has a high school diploma and a master's degree from the school of hard knocks. He would emphasize that to today's graduates: "I didn't have certain opportunities because I didn't have the education."

One More Lesson

At the end of our interview, I asked my dad about lessons he learned from people in his life, whom he admired. He returned to his youth and the horse stables. He described Sarge's owner, Bill Leach. "I always admired the way he carried himself with people and the way he dealt with problems in his life. He was very quiet, very deliberate and had a very calm demeanor." 

Ironically -- or perhaps not -- my father seems to be describing the man he has become since he was a redheaded teenager. Quiet, deliberate and someone to be admired. 

In our interview, he shared with me simple truths from his life about the value of hard work, handling change and treating people right. It's not a commencement speech that you'll find on YouTube, but it is a thoughtful conversation with one student -- his son -- who is still taking notes and learning lessons from his father. Class dismissed.