I have never heard anyone say a negative thing about my Uncle Jack. Everyone that met him liked him right away. I have been blessed by being surrounded by intelligent, good and caring people my entire life and Uncle Jack was one of the best.
The following is what was read at Uncle Jack's service. It says so much about him and it is so well done I had the minister send me the service.
___________________________________________
A Celebration of the Life of Jack W. Brink
Jack W. Brink was born January 19, 1936 in Seymour, Indiana to Walter and Ella Mae Brink. He and his family moved to Indianapolis when Jack was about six years old, where he attended St. Paul's Lutheran Grade School. He later completed two years at the old Manual High School. Within a short time Jack became a machinist at Link Belt Company, which was later purchased by FMC. He worked there for 39 years until he retired in December 1994.
Jack met his future bride, Sharon in 1954. At the time Jack bowled on the same league as Sharon's father, and Sharon's mom, in good matchmaking fashion, sent Sharon over to the bowling alley to meet him. Jack fell in love with Sharon at first sight. He told the guys he was bowling with, "Don't touch her. I'm going to marry her." After they met and started getting to know one another, he and Sharon used to roller skate at the Riverside Rink, enjoying each other's company. And true to his word, two years later in 1956, Jack married Sharon.
Jack and Sharon had two sons, Dennis and Terry. Jack liked to take them fishing—as is evident in the many pictures of him holding a fish or a fishing pole—including ice fishing in the winter. They also liked to play hockey at the conservation area, and when the hot air balloons would take off in the Indy area they like to chase them together. In later years Jack tried to get Sharon to go fishing with him, too, but she was scared to death. She finally gave in about ten years ago when they bought a pontoon boat and she went fishing with him, just so long as she didn't have to bait the hook, which he kindly did for her.
Jack, Sharon, Dennis, and Terry bowled together as a family for about thirty years, and Jack used to like to go to antique alleys with the boys. He had a high score of 299 and got the ring to prove it and to cherish his accomplishment.
Both boys were active in the Garfield "Y" Little League, so Jack and Sharon got involved, too. He was a coach, she served as league treasurer. They kept at it for a number of years even after Dennis and Terry no longer played, considering the boys on the team "their own" and defending them that way, too, when necessary. Sharon remembers that it was "stressful yet fun."
Jack liked to watch football. He was a fan first of the Chicago Bears, then of the Cincinnati Bengals. He and Dennis once traveled to Cincinnati for his first time watching a pro-football game in person. Later Jack became a Colts fan, and to her (and probably his) surprise, Sharon began watching football as well.
Jack had a great sense of humor. He loved to laugh. In fact, according to his family, he loved to laugh at other people's expense. I trust they speak from firsthand experience. He would hook Sharon as he began telling a fascinating story, only for her to discover that it wasn't true—he was just doing it for a laugh.
Sharon remembers a time not all that long ago when she watched Jack carrying a new mailbox on its post. From where she was, his silhouette made it look as though he were Jesus carrying the cross. He saw her staring at him and stopped to ask why. "You looked like Jesus," she told him. Without missing a beat he replied, "Now I'm God!"
Another time, Sharon went on a church retreat. Somehow, her pants "disintegrated" on the bus trip down to the retreat center in Brown County. When she got home, she told Jack, "I showed my butt today," to which he responded, "I knew it was just a matter of time before you showed your butt to the church people."
Jack kept his sense of humor all throughout the last several years when the blood disorder he was suffering from turned to a severe incurable leukemia. Even in recent weeks when he was in a nursing home, Jack joked with the people who worked there. Drew recalls that "he had a smile on his face a lot." "The more he smiled," his family noted, "the more you could see his dimples."
Jack's family remembers him as a man who dearly loved them. He always wanted to be together. He put his family first, and yet he also loved having company, even when he was in the hospital. During the last days of his earthly life, Debi was holding his hand at one point and asked him, "Do you want water or kisses?" "I'd rather have kisses," he said. And when he was in the nursing home, Jack said, "A thousand kisses aren't enough." As Debi and Dennis put it later, Jack wanted to stay with his family, but his body gave out.
Jack's love for his family showed through in a particularly poignant moment last Tuesday night, when he was experiencing a lot of pain. His sister, Ruth, was there. He often worried about Ruth and cared for her a great deal, as she cared about him. In the midst of his own suffering that night, he turned to her and asked, "How you doin', Ruth?"
His love for his family, and I suspect, his love for God, too, also appeared when Dennis and Debi were standing on either side of his hospice bed at home last week, sometime before he passed away on Thursday. Jack took their hands, held them up for a moment, and then put his own hands together in the air as if he were praying.
As a child Jack used to go to church. He stopped going as an adult, but he always believed in God. "God is real and he's good," he would tell Sharon. And according to her, "he ran his life that way."
__________________________________
Sharon also had a deep love for Jack, as he did for her. Sharon wrote a love letter to Jack in the last day or so, and has asked me to read it here today.
Hi, Robert Redford and Paul Newman,
This is my first and last love letter to you. (In case someone is wondering why I started my letter with those names, it's because that was my nick name for my blonde, blue-eyed lover.
Babe, there were some things in life that I wish I could have changed, but I couldn't and still you loved me anyway.
Thank you for our two wonderful sons and the grandchildren and great grandchildren they produced.
As you enter Heaven, I know God is with you and will love you until I get there.
When I look up at the stars and I see one winking at me, I know it will be you.
Good Bye for now,
Your Babe
_____________________________________________
Thank you Steve for sponsoring Uncle Jack's page.
The following is what was read at Uncle Jack's service. It says so much about him and it is so well done I had the minister send me the service.
___________________________________________
A Celebration of the Life of Jack W. Brink
Jack W. Brink was born January 19, 1936 in Seymour, Indiana to Walter and Ella Mae Brink. He and his family moved to Indianapolis when Jack was about six years old, where he attended St. Paul's Lutheran Grade School. He later completed two years at the old Manual High School. Within a short time Jack became a machinist at Link Belt Company, which was later purchased by FMC. He worked there for 39 years until he retired in December 1994.
Jack met his future bride, Sharon in 1954. At the time Jack bowled on the same league as Sharon's father, and Sharon's mom, in good matchmaking fashion, sent Sharon over to the bowling alley to meet him. Jack fell in love with Sharon at first sight. He told the guys he was bowling with, "Don't touch her. I'm going to marry her." After they met and started getting to know one another, he and Sharon used to roller skate at the Riverside Rink, enjoying each other's company. And true to his word, two years later in 1956, Jack married Sharon.
Jack and Sharon had two sons, Dennis and Terry. Jack liked to take them fishing—as is evident in the many pictures of him holding a fish or a fishing pole—including ice fishing in the winter. They also liked to play hockey at the conservation area, and when the hot air balloons would take off in the Indy area they like to chase them together. In later years Jack tried to get Sharon to go fishing with him, too, but she was scared to death. She finally gave in about ten years ago when they bought a pontoon boat and she went fishing with him, just so long as she didn't have to bait the hook, which he kindly did for her.
Jack, Sharon, Dennis, and Terry bowled together as a family for about thirty years, and Jack used to like to go to antique alleys with the boys. He had a high score of 299 and got the ring to prove it and to cherish his accomplishment.
Both boys were active in the Garfield "Y" Little League, so Jack and Sharon got involved, too. He was a coach, she served as league treasurer. They kept at it for a number of years even after Dennis and Terry no longer played, considering the boys on the team "their own" and defending them that way, too, when necessary. Sharon remembers that it was "stressful yet fun."
Jack liked to watch football. He was a fan first of the Chicago Bears, then of the Cincinnati Bengals. He and Dennis once traveled to Cincinnati for his first time watching a pro-football game in person. Later Jack became a Colts fan, and to her (and probably his) surprise, Sharon began watching football as well.
Jack had a great sense of humor. He loved to laugh. In fact, according to his family, he loved to laugh at other people's expense. I trust they speak from firsthand experience. He would hook Sharon as he began telling a fascinating story, only for her to discover that it wasn't true—he was just doing it for a laugh.
Sharon remembers a time not all that long ago when she watched Jack carrying a new mailbox on its post. From where she was, his silhouette made it look as though he were Jesus carrying the cross. He saw her staring at him and stopped to ask why. "You looked like Jesus," she told him. Without missing a beat he replied, "Now I'm God!"
Another time, Sharon went on a church retreat. Somehow, her pants "disintegrated" on the bus trip down to the retreat center in Brown County. When she got home, she told Jack, "I showed my butt today," to which he responded, "I knew it was just a matter of time before you showed your butt to the church people."
Jack kept his sense of humor all throughout the last several years when the blood disorder he was suffering from turned to a severe incurable leukemia. Even in recent weeks when he was in a nursing home, Jack joked with the people who worked there. Drew recalls that "he had a smile on his face a lot." "The more he smiled," his family noted, "the more you could see his dimples."
Jack's family remembers him as a man who dearly loved them. He always wanted to be together. He put his family first, and yet he also loved having company, even when he was in the hospital. During the last days of his earthly life, Debi was holding his hand at one point and asked him, "Do you want water or kisses?" "I'd rather have kisses," he said. And when he was in the nursing home, Jack said, "A thousand kisses aren't enough." As Debi and Dennis put it later, Jack wanted to stay with his family, but his body gave out.
Jack's love for his family showed through in a particularly poignant moment last Tuesday night, when he was experiencing a lot of pain. His sister, Ruth, was there. He often worried about Ruth and cared for her a great deal, as she cared about him. In the midst of his own suffering that night, he turned to her and asked, "How you doin', Ruth?"
His love for his family, and I suspect, his love for God, too, also appeared when Dennis and Debi were standing on either side of his hospice bed at home last week, sometime before he passed away on Thursday. Jack took their hands, held them up for a moment, and then put his own hands together in the air as if he were praying.
As a child Jack used to go to church. He stopped going as an adult, but he always believed in God. "God is real and he's good," he would tell Sharon. And according to her, "he ran his life that way."
__________________________________
Sharon also had a deep love for Jack, as he did for her. Sharon wrote a love letter to Jack in the last day or so, and has asked me to read it here today.
Hi, Robert Redford and Paul Newman,
This is my first and last love letter to you. (In case someone is wondering why I started my letter with those names, it's because that was my nick name for my blonde, blue-eyed lover.
Babe, there were some things in life that I wish I could have changed, but I couldn't and still you loved me anyway.
Thank you for our two wonderful sons and the grandchildren and great grandchildren they produced.
As you enter Heaven, I know God is with you and will love you until I get there.
When I look up at the stars and I see one winking at me, I know it will be you.
Good Bye for now,
Your Babe
_____________________________________________
Thank you Steve for sponsoring Uncle Jack's page.
I have never heard anyone say a negative thing about my Uncle Jack. Everyone that met him liked him right away. I have been blessed by being surrounded by intelligent, good and caring people my entire life and Uncle Jack was one of the best.
The following is what was read at Uncle Jack's service. It says so much about him and it is so well done I had the minister send me the service.
___________________________________________
A Celebration of the Life of Jack W. Brink
Jack W. Brink was born January 19, 1936 in Seymour, Indiana to Walter and Ella Mae Brink. He and his family moved to Indianapolis when Jack was about six years old, where he attended St. Paul's Lutheran Grade School. He later completed two years at the old Manual High School. Within a short time Jack became a machinist at Link Belt Company, which was later purchased by FMC. He worked there for 39 years until he retired in December 1994.
Jack met his future bride, Sharon in 1954. At the time Jack bowled on the same league as Sharon's father, and Sharon's mom, in good matchmaking fashion, sent Sharon over to the bowling alley to meet him. Jack fell in love with Sharon at first sight. He told the guys he was bowling with, "Don't touch her. I'm going to marry her." After they met and started getting to know one another, he and Sharon used to roller skate at the Riverside Rink, enjoying each other's company. And true to his word, two years later in 1956, Jack married Sharon.
Jack and Sharon had two sons, Dennis and Terry. Jack liked to take them fishing—as is evident in the many pictures of him holding a fish or a fishing pole—including ice fishing in the winter. They also liked to play hockey at the conservation area, and when the hot air balloons would take off in the Indy area they like to chase them together. In later years Jack tried to get Sharon to go fishing with him, too, but she was scared to death. She finally gave in about ten years ago when they bought a pontoon boat and she went fishing with him, just so long as she didn't have to bait the hook, which he kindly did for her.
Jack, Sharon, Dennis, and Terry bowled together as a family for about thirty years, and Jack used to like to go to antique alleys with the boys. He had a high score of 299 and got the ring to prove it and to cherish his accomplishment.
Both boys were active in the Garfield "Y" Little League, so Jack and Sharon got involved, too. He was a coach, she served as league treasurer. They kept at it for a number of years even after Dennis and Terry no longer played, considering the boys on the team "their own" and defending them that way, too, when necessary. Sharon remembers that it was "stressful yet fun."
Jack liked to watch football. He was a fan first of the Chicago Bears, then of the Cincinnati Bengals. He and Dennis once traveled to Cincinnati for his first time watching a pro-football game in person. Later Jack became a Colts fan, and to her (and probably his) surprise, Sharon began watching football as well.
Jack had a great sense of humor. He loved to laugh. In fact, according to his family, he loved to laugh at other people's expense. I trust they speak from firsthand experience. He would hook Sharon as he began telling a fascinating story, only for her to discover that it wasn't true—he was just doing it for a laugh.
Sharon remembers a time not all that long ago when she watched Jack carrying a new mailbox on its post. From where she was, his silhouette made it look as though he were Jesus carrying the cross. He saw her staring at him and stopped to ask why. "You looked like Jesus," she told him. Without missing a beat he replied, "Now I'm God!"
Another time, Sharon went on a church retreat. Somehow, her pants "disintegrated" on the bus trip down to the retreat center in Brown County. When she got home, she told Jack, "I showed my butt today," to which he responded, "I knew it was just a matter of time before you showed your butt to the church people."
Jack kept his sense of humor all throughout the last several years when the blood disorder he was suffering from turned to a severe incurable leukemia. Even in recent weeks when he was in a nursing home, Jack joked with the people who worked there. Drew recalls that "he had a smile on his face a lot." "The more he smiled," his family noted, "the more you could see his dimples."
Jack's family remembers him as a man who dearly loved them. He always wanted to be together. He put his family first, and yet he also loved having company, even when he was in the hospital. During the last days of his earthly life, Debi was holding his hand at one point and asked him, "Do you want water or kisses?" "I'd rather have kisses," he said. And when he was in the nursing home, Jack said, "A thousand kisses aren't enough." As Debi and Dennis put it later, Jack wanted to stay with his family, but his body gave out.
Jack's love for his family showed through in a particularly poignant moment last Tuesday night, when he was experiencing a lot of pain. His sister, Ruth, was there. He often worried about Ruth and cared for her a great deal, as she cared about him. In the midst of his own suffering that night, he turned to her and asked, "How you doin', Ruth?"
His love for his family, and I suspect, his love for God, too, also appeared when Dennis and Debi were standing on either side of his hospice bed at home last week, sometime before he passed away on Thursday. Jack took their hands, held them up for a moment, and then put his own hands together in the air as if he were praying.
As a child Jack used to go to church. He stopped going as an adult, but he always believed in God. "God is real and he's good," he would tell Sharon. And according to her, "he ran his life that way."
__________________________________
Sharon also had a deep love for Jack, as he did for her. Sharon wrote a love letter to Jack in the last day or so, and has asked me to read it here today.
Hi, Robert Redford and Paul Newman,
This is my first and last love letter to you. (In case someone is wondering why I started my letter with those names, it's because that was my nick name for my blonde, blue-eyed lover.
Babe, there were some things in life that I wish I could have changed, but I couldn't and still you loved me anyway.
Thank you for our two wonderful sons and the grandchildren and great grandchildren they produced.
As you enter Heaven, I know God is with you and will love you until I get there.
When I look up at the stars and I see one winking at me, I know it will be you.
Good Bye for now,
Your Babe
_____________________________________________
Thank you Steve for sponsoring Uncle Jack's page.
The following is what was read at Uncle Jack's service. It says so much about him and it is so well done I had the minister send me the service.
___________________________________________
A Celebration of the Life of Jack W. Brink
Jack W. Brink was born January 19, 1936 in Seymour, Indiana to Walter and Ella Mae Brink. He and his family moved to Indianapolis when Jack was about six years old, where he attended St. Paul's Lutheran Grade School. He later completed two years at the old Manual High School. Within a short time Jack became a machinist at Link Belt Company, which was later purchased by FMC. He worked there for 39 years until he retired in December 1994.
Jack met his future bride, Sharon in 1954. At the time Jack bowled on the same league as Sharon's father, and Sharon's mom, in good matchmaking fashion, sent Sharon over to the bowling alley to meet him. Jack fell in love with Sharon at first sight. He told the guys he was bowling with, "Don't touch her. I'm going to marry her." After they met and started getting to know one another, he and Sharon used to roller skate at the Riverside Rink, enjoying each other's company. And true to his word, two years later in 1956, Jack married Sharon.
Jack and Sharon had two sons, Dennis and Terry. Jack liked to take them fishing—as is evident in the many pictures of him holding a fish or a fishing pole—including ice fishing in the winter. They also liked to play hockey at the conservation area, and when the hot air balloons would take off in the Indy area they like to chase them together. In later years Jack tried to get Sharon to go fishing with him, too, but she was scared to death. She finally gave in about ten years ago when they bought a pontoon boat and she went fishing with him, just so long as she didn't have to bait the hook, which he kindly did for her.
Jack, Sharon, Dennis, and Terry bowled together as a family for about thirty years, and Jack used to like to go to antique alleys with the boys. He had a high score of 299 and got the ring to prove it and to cherish his accomplishment.
Both boys were active in the Garfield "Y" Little League, so Jack and Sharon got involved, too. He was a coach, she served as league treasurer. They kept at it for a number of years even after Dennis and Terry no longer played, considering the boys on the team "their own" and defending them that way, too, when necessary. Sharon remembers that it was "stressful yet fun."
Jack liked to watch football. He was a fan first of the Chicago Bears, then of the Cincinnati Bengals. He and Dennis once traveled to Cincinnati for his first time watching a pro-football game in person. Later Jack became a Colts fan, and to her (and probably his) surprise, Sharon began watching football as well.
Jack had a great sense of humor. He loved to laugh. In fact, according to his family, he loved to laugh at other people's expense. I trust they speak from firsthand experience. He would hook Sharon as he began telling a fascinating story, only for her to discover that it wasn't true—he was just doing it for a laugh.
Sharon remembers a time not all that long ago when she watched Jack carrying a new mailbox on its post. From where she was, his silhouette made it look as though he were Jesus carrying the cross. He saw her staring at him and stopped to ask why. "You looked like Jesus," she told him. Without missing a beat he replied, "Now I'm God!"
Another time, Sharon went on a church retreat. Somehow, her pants "disintegrated" on the bus trip down to the retreat center in Brown County. When she got home, she told Jack, "I showed my butt today," to which he responded, "I knew it was just a matter of time before you showed your butt to the church people."
Jack kept his sense of humor all throughout the last several years when the blood disorder he was suffering from turned to a severe incurable leukemia. Even in recent weeks when he was in a nursing home, Jack joked with the people who worked there. Drew recalls that "he had a smile on his face a lot." "The more he smiled," his family noted, "the more you could see his dimples."
Jack's family remembers him as a man who dearly loved them. He always wanted to be together. He put his family first, and yet he also loved having company, even when he was in the hospital. During the last days of his earthly life, Debi was holding his hand at one point and asked him, "Do you want water or kisses?" "I'd rather have kisses," he said. And when he was in the nursing home, Jack said, "A thousand kisses aren't enough." As Debi and Dennis put it later, Jack wanted to stay with his family, but his body gave out.
Jack's love for his family showed through in a particularly poignant moment last Tuesday night, when he was experiencing a lot of pain. His sister, Ruth, was there. He often worried about Ruth and cared for her a great deal, as she cared about him. In the midst of his own suffering that night, he turned to her and asked, "How you doin', Ruth?"
His love for his family, and I suspect, his love for God, too, also appeared when Dennis and Debi were standing on either side of his hospice bed at home last week, sometime before he passed away on Thursday. Jack took their hands, held them up for a moment, and then put his own hands together in the air as if he were praying.
As a child Jack used to go to church. He stopped going as an adult, but he always believed in God. "God is real and he's good," he would tell Sharon. And according to her, "he ran his life that way."
__________________________________
Sharon also had a deep love for Jack, as he did for her. Sharon wrote a love letter to Jack in the last day or so, and has asked me to read it here today.
Hi, Robert Redford and Paul Newman,
This is my first and last love letter to you. (In case someone is wondering why I started my letter with those names, it's because that was my nick name for my blonde, blue-eyed lover.
Babe, there were some things in life that I wish I could have changed, but I couldn't and still you loved me anyway.
Thank you for our two wonderful sons and the grandchildren and great grandchildren they produced.
As you enter Heaven, I know God is with you and will love you until I get there.
When I look up at the stars and I see one winking at me, I know it will be you.
Good Bye for now,
Your Babe
_____________________________________________
Thank you Steve for sponsoring Uncle Jack's page.
