Below is a several-page excerpt from the early pages of 52 and Strangely Found. It is my second autobiography, and though it stands on its own, it might profitably be read with 39 and Lost in America (1991). I wrote this second autobiography during the Summer of 2004.

52 and Strangely Found: An Autobiography Intellectual and Intimate, pp. 5-8.

My Mother's Family

My mother's family traces its American origins to the 1630s in Stratford, CT when one Frances Nichols, twelve generations removed from my mother, was a founding member of the Stratford Town Company in 1639. Nichols was a Puritan by religion, had come to Boston in the mid-1630s and then left for the greener pastures of the New Haven community probably late in 1638. A tiff with the authoritarian leader of that community, John Davenport, landed my moderate Puritan forbear in that town, named for the hometown of the Bard, just six miles west of the holy colony. The name of the town was indicative of the religious spirit of my ancestors: they would be Puritans, no doubt, but Puritans of the gentler sort--who may have seen themselves as the New Israel but never forgot that the land they inhabited was also supposed to be filled with milk and honey.

It was not until 1830 that a great-great-great-great-great granddaugter of Frances, also surnamed Nichols, married Dr. Watson B. Lynch, who himself was the great grandfather of my grandmother, Jeannette Lynch. The family never sojourned far from the Stratford roots, though nineteenth century entries in the family geneaology listing births, marriages and deaths in Scotia, NY indicate a movement west and north by certain of my family members after the Revolutionary War. My grandmother was born and raised in Stamford, CT, one of the oldest towns in Fairfield County. The Lynch clan took up residence in a small enclave of that city called Glenbrook, tucked between Stamford and Darien, which was anchored by the Phillips mansion, mute testimony to the growing influence of milk of magnesia as the medical nostrum prescribed by doctors for minor and major stomach irritations.

By the time I became aware of my surroundings in the Darien-Glenbrook axis, there was a large nursing home sitting opposite the Phillips mansion, a home in which my grandmother's mother, affectionately known as "Gaga," lived out the last years of her long life. I never inquired whether that hypocorism arose because the boys in the 1880s, when "Gaga" came of age, went "gaga" over her or, more likely, because the great-grandchildren in her declining years were unable to mouth "great grandmother" and had to be content with a "Gaga." In any case, Gaga never seemed to mind being called Gaga, even when we kids were skillful enough to have mumbled something more sophisticated. Indeed, if any of our friends knew we called our great-grandmother "Gaga," we probably would have been social outcasts in our peer group for at least a decade.

Gaga had a sister, as most Gagas did in those days, who married the Rev. Dr. Samuel Evers, a distinguished graduate of the Yale Divinity School when divinity schools actually were respected in American life. He followed the old tradition of New England Congregational clergy by deciding to settle down in one parish for his entire ministry, which happened to be our small congregational church called the Union Memorial Church in Glenbrook. The Church itself was founded only in the mid 1890s, and Dr. Evers, born in 1870, was the first pastor of that congregation. He retired at the end of World War II but still faithfully came to church each Sunday, which was no doubt a mixed blessing for his long-term successor, the Rev. Dr. Thorpe Bauer.

Uncle Evers, as he was known to all, even though he really was only MY uncle, would set his increasingly ample frame in his favorite pew, about halfway back in the congregation directly in front of the pulpit, fold his hands, put on a cherubic smile and then usually fall asleep about halfway through the service. The advantage of that behavior, I noted as a child, was that he seemed much more chipper and optimistic than most of the rest of the congregation at the end of the service.

Though he had long retired from the ministry by the time of my earliest remembrance, he would be invited as an honored guest to read the Scriptures each Easter service until his death. I recall such a service near the end of his life. Dr. Bauer solemnly intoned that Dr. Evers was celebrating his 70th Easter with the Congregation. The old gentleman arose in his frayed doctoral gown, the red hood twisted and slightly discolored, shuffled to the pulpit, opened the Bible and began to read. Though the Revised Standard Version had just been issued a few years previously, and was toted to church by the eager young seminarian interns at the congregation from Yale or Union Seminary (NYC), Dr. Evers read from the majestic King James Version.

But this year, which turned out to be the last year of his life, something happened. It was as if he couldn't see the words of the Bible. He squinted through his thick glasses, fiddled with the pulpit light, but could not discern the words on the page. Only a few years before, at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy as President of the United States, another distinguished grizzled New Englander, Robert Frost, had also been unable to read the words of the poems written in honor of Kennedy's inauguration. But the biblical text was so familiar to Dr. Evers that he simply recited the Easter story with a sonority and authority that made me see that it was actually possible for a person, if he really tried, and really loved what he did, to become a sort of living text. Just a few months later, during Sunday worship, the Rev. Dr. Evers assumed his regular position and fell asleep just before the sermon, but this time never awoke. The last image that any had of him was the cherubic smile of a contented man.

When I became aware of the fact that I didn't like church, a new assistant pastor had been installed, The Rev. Charles Mullendore, a youthful and energetic man whose credo was modern, whose manner was accepting and whose goal seemed to be to win over every person of every age to his progressive Gospel. He attended the March on Washington in the summer of 1963 and wanted to teach us choruses that he learned while in D.C. I'll never forget the sight of 80 year-old New England matrons gamely trying to put gusto into a chorus of "If I Had a Hammer." He came to my sixth grade Sunday school class and quizzed us on what we thought about God. When I casually told him I was an atheist, he stopped and tried to help me come up with arguments that would make my atheism more solid. He didn't want just casual atheists in his sixth grade classes. If anything, however, the tenor of the congregation was tepid. Religion was something you did on Sunday morning while the roast was cooking, and most of us looked at the Rev. Mr. Mullendore with a mixture of bemusement and gentle tolerance.

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