[rcecale]

Denis, I'm sorry for your loss, buddy. You've spoken a lot of your family in MN, so I know you're very close with them. Cherish the memories, they're yours forever!

From what I just read, your uncle was a stellar person.

Uncle Pat died on Wednesday.

He lived his whole life in service to other people...my dad wrote the following, and I'll just add that everyone who grew up around these parts knew him as the "bubble-gum man"; if you knocked on his door with a penny, he'd turn it into a piece of Bazooka.

Retired Detective Lieutenant Patrick Thomas ("Pat") Hartigan, whom former Police Chief Anthony Bouza once characterized as, "an urban saint," died at his home in Minneapolis on January 25. He was 75 years old. Predeceased by his parents and one sister, Mary Louise, he is survived by three siblings: retired Municipal Judge Bruce Hartigan; Michael, also a retired city employee; Katherine ("Punkin") Hubbell, of Minnetonka; and a large number of loving cousins, nieces, nephews and friends. A 30-year veteran of the police force, Hartigan was walking a Franklin Avenue beat in 1958 when he came upon an older man who had been beaten and robbed. "He had lost everything he had," Hartigan reported. The policeman volunteered to manage the man's finances, and to dole out his money to him as he needed it. "I'm a stable address," he said, "and my mailbox doesn't get ripped off." Before long, he found himself doing the same for many of the people along his beat, most of them native Americans; through the years, he accumulated hundreds of "clients." He made many enduring friendships, loaned or gave many of them a great deal of his own money, served as best man at their weddings and became godfather to many of their children. In an effort to explain his attitude, he once said, "They're poor and powerless, but they are made in the image and likeness of God. You can't help but like them."

Hartigan never married. He provided a home for his mother for many years, during which time his Franklin Avenue "clients" often telephoned him or knocked on his door in the middle of the night seeking help. Once, when his mother lost patience and berated him for losing sleep and spending energy on people in trouble with the law or in the grip of alcoholism, he replied that for all he knew that was Christ knocking at his door. On another occasion, he complained to his sister that he had bought a house for a family of seven that had no place to live, then found that he had no money left with which to pay his taxes, Within hours, he received a telephone call from the McKnight Foundation notifying him that he was to receive its Humanitarian Award, which included an honorarium of $5.000. In 1991, he received The Archbishop's Catholic Charities Award for seeing to it that, "justice and help were given to the poor and needy."

"Free as he was with his own money, he imposed sensible spending disciplines on those whose finances he managed. Once, when his methods were questioned, the Police Department's Internal Affairs Department found that all those involved "had the utmost trust and confidence" in him and wanted no one else and no other method employed to control their assets. As a result of the investigation, Police Chief Bouza noted that, "Lieutenant Hartigan appears to have done a great deal of good through his compassionate concern for the less fortunate. He deserves to be commended."

Compassionate as he was, Hartigan was as tough as a cop sometimes must be. He was off duty and ready to retire one Christmas Season night in 1974 when the TV news reported that three young desperados had taken 55 people hostage in a Richfield supermarket. Proceeding to the store instead of to bed, Hartigan found it surrounded by a virtual brigade of snipers, and pleas to the robbers to lay down their weapons and come out were being broadcast through bulhorns. Approaching the officer in charge, Hartigan advised that he knew the robbers and obtained permission to deal with the situation. Entering the supermarket alone and standing at a checkout counter, he shouted his name and said, "All right, Boys, everybody up front, come on, come up here and lay down the guns." They came meekly, and laid down their guns. He marched them out of the store, hands high in the air. A bloodbath had been averted. "They were just scared kids," Hartigan insisted. "They weren't vicious; they weren't going to shoot anyone." For this act, Hartigan was named Minnesota's Police Officer of the Year, and received a fulsome congratulatory letter from then U.S. President Gerald R.Ford.

A memorial mass will be celebrated at the Church of St. Thomas the Apostle, 2914 West 44th Street, Minneapolis, at 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday, February 1.

More here.

God bless, Denis!

Randy