Francis "Frank" Torsak

From reading mothers journal I learned: The depression was near the end but money was still tight and things had to last. Frank wore holes into his work clothes and mother kept patching them up for him. His friends at work jokeingly called him "HONERABLE PATCHES", the name of a book at that time. Frank joked around with them but it must have felt good to "finally graduate from patches" (as mother put it) He eventually bought a car and didn't have to walk all the miles to and from work every...

I am the neice of Frank (Francis) Torsak. I would like to pay tribute to my uncle by sharing somethings about him. Uncle Frank was a quiet, kind and soft spoken man. I was fortunate to know him throughout my early childhood and teen years. I lost contact with him when he moved to Lake Tahoe, CA
with his last wife. He never complained, gossiped, critized nor had any negative words about anyone. He kept his life and its ups and downs to himself. He worked hard and long hours at North...

Our father, Frank, had a tenacious nature. If there was something he needed to do, he stuck to it, as we can see from this little story. In his early days working at North American Aviation he set about finding a house for himself, his wife and first son. After work each day, he looked for a rental near his employment, as he had no car. In our mother Rhoda’s memoirs we read: “Always the same old story. A month’s rent in advance and ‘no children allowed.’ Many people would say ‘A dog,...

I’d like to share one of our mother’s memories of a quality our father had. Telling about some of their early days, she wrote: “This was the time of the great depression. Every day, long lines of people stood at the employment office of every business looking for work. Many days Frank stood in those lines from early morning until closing time at night. One night at closing time, he lay down on a bench in the outer waiting room. They told him he would have to go, they were closing. He...

I too am glad that Carol has had a chance to express her thoughts and feelings about the father that no one knew. This will also give the decendants some insight into his life. Thanks for providing this outlet.

I am happy that my Wife Carol Ann has had this opportunity to find closure with her father.