Remembering Floyd

Today is Father's Day. My dad left this world at age 76 in 1994. Still, I honor him this day.

My father was the youngest of a family of nine children. (He said 10, but his youngest "brother" was actually a child of his sister, being raised by his mother. Travis died young from "consumption".)

Dad was a child of poverty. Extreme poverty. I once saw the place where he was raised and was appalled at the level of poverty.

My father was born with some kind of disability. He was put aside to die when he was born, but his sister would not let that happen. She cleaned him up and put him to his mother's breast. In time, with a change of doctors, the family was told to "let him run"...which he did. I was told that he ran and ran to keep up with the other kids until he fell flat on his face. Something about him just worked.

By the time Floyd Darwin Covill graduated from high school, he was one of the top 25 athletes in the state of Illinois. He was the first of his family to graduate...and then received an athletic scholarship with Illinois State Normal University, where he met my mother. Dad was the Redbirds' big football star. Little All American. Fullback hero.

When Mom and Dad eloped, it was out of respect for the economic times. Now married to a farm family that had resources from the land, he was in his element. He loved my mother's parents as his own--his own having died not long after he graduated from college. And they loved him. When WW II started, he took a commission with the Navy Reserve and served our country through the Korean War and beyond.

I knew my father as a hard-working man who took on two or three jobs to keep his family afloat through tough times. He venerated my mother as his partner in life. I wasn't close to him until my mother died. Then I understood.

Floyd Darwin Covill:
#24 Fullback for the ISNU Redbirds; Hall of Fame recipient for 1941.
Commander, USNR (ret) after 20 years of faithful service.
Coach of the Week for Dwight HS (need to find the year).
Past Commander of the Streator, IL, branch of the American Legion.
Father and general good guy who rose above his beginnings and raised a family in spite of all.

I honor my father this Father's Day. I still miss him.