The Earth Was His Canvas

I met Charlie Miller on the job back in 1974.  I had just started working for the USDA’s Soil Conservation Service in Adams County.  As my SCS co-worker and I drove up along side a parked green pickup truck with the sign John F. Walters Inc. printed on the driver-side door, I could hear country western music playing loud enough to be heard over top noise of an idling Caterpillar dozer resting nearby.  The operator was sitting on the truck’s tail gate sipping a cup of steaming coffee and munching a cookie.  He smiled as we rolled to a stop and greeted us with a friendly “How do?”

Soil Conservation Technician Bill McCleaf introduced me to Charlie as the newest employee in the Gettysburg Field Office and the first woman Soil Conservationist in Pennsylvania.  I nodded politely and then listened intently as the two men discussed the progress on the conservation practice Charlie was carving onto the landscape that day.  I came to find out that almost every pond, diversion, waterway, or cropland terrace in the county was the masterpiece of either Charlie or his son, Mike.  The two were a team and could make an enormous project look easy once they set their blade and bucket to work.

I went about the business of setting up the surveying equipment to check the elevations and see where high or low spots needed to be filled in or taken out.  I was learning quickly how to level the Dumpey and run the surveying equipment, writing down the elevations in the notebook, while Bill moved the rod along the top of the mounded ground.  Bill was a patient trainer as he educated this college graduate about the job, helping me apply my book learning to real life.  Charlie sat aboard his machine and throttled up the dozer as we gave him the thumbs up on another perfect job.

As we pulled away from that job site, what I didn’t know after that first introduction to Charlie Miller was how much this man would mean to me and my life in the years ahead.  I found out later that, when he got home that day and met up with his son Mike, he informed him that if he didn’t marry me, he would divorce my future mother-in-law and marry me himself.  Of course, he was just teasing his stay-at-home son who spent all of his time running a Caterpillar front-end loader or hunting.  Charlie and Mike enjoyed working together and shared a love of the outdoors.  They saved up their time and money to travel out West to hunt elk and antelope.  They were close to one another, both on and off the job.

Eventually that summer, I met Mike who had just finished building a huge pond for Purina Mills, near Camp Hill.  He was building a diversion terrace and clearing out old trees for Guy Donaldson, an Adams County fruit grower who would become president of Pennsylvania Farm Bureau many years later.  I waved to the dark-haired and dusty driver as the tracks of his machine clacked loudly over the dry ground.  Without a break in his concentration, Mike kept creating a channel to safely carry storm water across the steep hillside.  Was he watching my surveying techniques out of the corner of his eye?  As I packed up our equipment and was heading back to the truck, I noticed a slight nod in our direction.  That was the beginning of three decades together as Mike and I became friends and then husband and wife in October 1975.

Charlie and his wife Kathaleen welcomed me into their family with open arms.  It took me many years to shift from “Charlie” to “Dad” but I eventually made the transition.  He was always a big cheerleader for Mike and me as we plunged ahead with our future goals.  When Soil Conservation Service transferred me from Adams to Berks County, Charlie never complained when his son and earth-moving partner picked up and left home to follow his wife’s career path.  Dad kept on building ponds and constructing conservation practices in Adams County, and eventually on the farms that Mike and I bought in Berks County.  Just four years ago, Dad jumped down off the big “Cat” for the last time in order to be with mother who was suffering from dementia and needed his constant care.  A few months later, Dad suffered a stroke that affected his left side and changed our family’s life.

After he was released from the hospital, Dad moved to a nursing home near Gettysburg.  The care he received from the nurses and staff brought him back to life.  Even though he was confined to a wheel chair, Dad always kept a positive perspective on his situation and tried to cheer up the other residents whenever he could.  As we wheeled around the hallways or along the pathways outside, Dad would look enviously at the mechanized chairs that some of the folks operated independently.  He commented that he wished he could have a chance to drive one of them someday.  I let him try out the control lever on a parked chair one day as we squeezed past.  His right hand gripped the knob with a familiar ease.  I could almost hear the engine roar once again as both of our memories drifted back to those long-ago days when the smell of fresh earth, green fields and warm sunshine filled our senses.

Dad’s final hours this week were spent with children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren at his bedside.  We were blessed to be able to say goodbye and share a few more memories with him before his passing.  A man of great faith and a big, strong heart, Charlie Miller has left his mark on the fields of Adams County.  Many of his ponds and earthwork masterpieces now outlive the man who built them.  And while a tombstone marks the final resting place for this special man and his wife who are now joined in heaven, his lasting monument will always be the conservation work he created on the land that he loved.  Thank you Charlie … thank you, Dad.

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