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April 14, 2009
We left the
bank and went home. Bob had told me that I was looking at around Two hundred
million for this project and I understood he had about thirty million over
that but almost one hundred million, I was not expecting that at all. Fay
said she can't handle this at all, I have more money than I need already. I
don't want any more. Mr. Shields told me he was relieved by not having the
money anymore. It has been a burden for years. It's a very large
responsibility.
I put the suitcase on my bed when I
came home and after awhile I started thinking about it. What did he want
to give me? I went in and opened it. It looked to be full of towels.
Laying on top was an envelope. I opened it and there was a key and a
note. This is a key to my home, You are welcome to anything in it you
would like. Dispose of any thing you don't want. I will not be coming
back. I will be on a cruise ship. My cancer will be taking me in a few
short weeks and I would rather die on a cruise ship than in a hospital
somewhere. I have pain medicine and I will be fine. Thank you Miss Brown
for allowing me to put all my burdens on you and I know you will do a
good job on the housing project. Your responsibility is great but you
are young and strong of mind and body and you will do much better than I
ever could. Spend my money as if it was yours because now it is yours.
So please enjoy it or put it in the foundation and help people, its all
up to you. With all the luck in the world, Good bye. Don Shields.
I removed the towel and there was
another larger envelope, These are my rentals and the names of the
people who rent them and the maintenance people who work for me and the
rental agents who collect the money for me. The red box contains things
of mine, my wife's and my two children's. The blue box contains things
of my mother's my father's and my three brothers. The brown box was my
grandmother's and grandfather's and their three boys' things. The small
black box was my great grandfathers things. I opened the red box first.
There were wedding rings for both he and his wife, a UCLA ring of his
daughter and two high school rings of the two children and several other
rings, birthstone rings and an engagement ring of his
daughter's. Several necklaces one pearl and one diamond with a matching
bracelet, several school medals from sports events, and several letters.
I opened the blue box next. It had rings from the boys, one from Harvard
one from UCLA and three sets of wedding rings, one set of rings were the
parents wedding rings. There were medals from WWII and Vietnam and
pictures of children and couples in wedding dress and military uniforms.
There were three bundles of letters for the boys and their wives when
they were at war. The family had served their country well. Two boys
didn't come home from Vietnam.
The brown box contained his grandparents
and family things. There were pictures of WWI soldiers, medals and
family pictures and a set of rings that were both bands and a locket and
many letters and some baby teeth and a railroad watch and some jacks an
old top and some marbles. And a small porcelain doll. The small black
box was his great grandfather's. There were deeds to several properties
from a Spanish land grant and a Civil War buckle and a few medals from
the north and several letters and a locket with two pictures in it and a
derringer. In the bottom of the suitcase were papers and a Shirley
Temple doll in a box and there were six complete coin collections of
pennies, nickels, dimes quarters half dollars and the last one of dollar
coins. They all ended in the sixties. A bag of gold coins,
thirty-two twenty dollar gold coins and about a hundred gold and silver
mixed coins the newest 1910. There are Two pistols, a thirty-two colt
single action and a Navy Colt from the Civil War and some baby clothes
wrapped in cellophane. A family bible with birth dates and wedding dates
and death dates.
The things people save tell a story of
a lifetime and in this suitcase covering five or six lifetimes. I put
everything back in the suitcase and put it in the top of my closet. It
will have to wait for another time. In the next few days I will start
the Shields Foundation and get a contract started for the Project. I am
tired and complicated at the moment. And I want to rest..........KB
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