Tommy Anderson

Remembering Tommy Anderson

Wesley Church sadly said goodbye this month to our head usher, who was only a member of this congregation for a short tenure: 75 years. I wish we could all be like Tommy Anderson, who passed away on August 1 at the age of 102. He was the most humble man I ever met. A decorated World War II veteran and recipient of the Congressional Gold Medal as a member of the Ghost Army, you would never know it being around him.

On Sunday mornings before the 9:30 service (where he was head usher), I would leave after the early service downstairs and walk up the steps to greet Tommy in the main vestibule. He always arrived early and like clockwork, there he would be in his customary chair, come rain or come shine, year in and year out. "Timeless" is a good word.

The church was quiet upstairs for a short time between the two services. I was like a kid in a candy store asking Tommy about his life growing up in Dover in the 1930's and his service in World War II. He was the last of the greatest generation and I couldn't help myself.

Tommy recounted things like: being raised on a steamboat that travelled up and down the east coast (his dad was steamboat captain) and only coming to Dover to live at the age of 9 to start school for the first time...and at the Battle of the Bulge his toes became so frostbitten in subzero temperatures that he could hardly walk, but he found a way to persevere so as not to let his unit down. (Tommy said that in civilian life he would "move" before he would ever be that cold again, which is saying something having lived in Dover since 1934.)

The stories Tommy told on those quiet Sunday mornings were priceless. All that being said, he would not want us to make a fuss about him. But this must be said: Faith and Country. The rest of us mostly talk about it. He lived it.

Bobby Taylor, member of Wesley United Methodist Church