Otto Finley, 1912-2010

     When I saw the return address – Quaker Hill Road, Union Bridge, MD – I knew the news contained in the envelope couldn’t be good.  It is the address of my second cousin, Sue.  For several years she has been taking care of her father, Otto, who was married to my mother’s first cousin, Julia. As expected, the card inside told of his death and of his graveside service at Arlington National Cemetery.
     There were eighteen Espy first cousins in my mother’s generation, the grandchildren of Julia Jefferson and Robert Hamilton Espy of Oysterville.  The eighteen saw each other frequently during their childhoods and remained close throughout their lives.  My mother, who lived until she was four months shy of 98, was the last of them.
     As they married, ‘the cousins’ increased in numbers, for the spouses were gathered tightly into the family fold.  Otto was married to Julia Christensen, the cousin everyone agreed was the most beautiful. They met at Bellingham Normal School and, after his graduation in 1934, Otto taught grammar school for three years before entering the Navy as an Aviation Cadet.
     My earliest memories of Otto go back to World War Two when he was an officer aboard the aircraft carrier USS Hornet.  In those days we lived in Alameda, California, and, on the infrequent occasions that Otto was at Treasure Island for a few days, we would have a family dinner in his honor.  I remember him as handsome in his ‘dress whites’ and always so gentlemanly to the ladies.
     Otto retired with the rank of Captain after 26 years of service and then became Director of National and International Competitions for the National Rifle Association. Until 1974, he was a member of the National Olympic and International Shooting Committee and was entering sharp-shooting competitions even into his nineties.
     Nyel and I visited with Otto when we went East in 2002.  At that time he was living in West Virginia where he owned and operated a 10-acre farm and orchard near Levels.  It included 30 acres of peaches and 12 acres of apples, with the remainder in pasture and hay.  A herd of 12 Angus cows was included in the operation.  During our visit, he took us to Harper’s Ferry where he gave us his ‘personal tour’ of the town made famous by John Brown’s raid during the Civil War.
     Otto often came to Oysterville to our family reunions and he and I talked a lot about the skeletons in the family closet.  Between the two of us, we figured we knew where most of the bodies were buried.  When my Uncle Willard died in 1999, Otto took over as ‘family genealogist,’ noting the births and deaths, marriages and divorces that had occurred since the last reunion.
     I shall miss Otto greatly.  He was the last one of that generation – the last flesh-and-blood connection to people and family events that those of us who are left have only heard about.  I hope we listened hard enough.