Throughout his 25 books that have entertained, shocked, outraged, and humored millions of readers Lewis Grizzard, Jr. (LG) always spoke with the highest degree of love and respect for both of his natural parents.
In his 1991 tribute to his mother, Christine Word Grizzard Atkinson, “Don’t Forget to Call Your Mama…I Wish I Could Call Mine.” LG details his life with his mother in 140 pages with his request that if he died after his third aortic valve replacement, “Put me next to Mama!”
He survived that operation but would require a fourth one and died on March 20, 1994, at the age of 47.
The story of his father, Lewis Grizzard, Sr.
is much more complicated, but his son also loved his father with the same amount of adoration even though his father was an alcoholic, often homeless person, and divorced from Christine.
He also was a war hero!
LG was a self-admitted “mama’s boy” and candidly explains in said book the emotional trauma that he underwent when his parents divorced and his mom remarried when he was 10 and the changes in his life that he had to undergo when his stepfather came into his life.
In the preceding book about his mother and in two of his books he speaks favorable about his father and was holding his father’s hand when he died in 1970.
The Grizzards had married in 1942 and Lewis, Sr. shortly afterwards was shipped out to Europe and WWII.
He rose through the Army ranks to become a Captain and landed in Normandy on D Day in 1944. After fighting in France and Germany he returned to America with a Purple Heart, Bronze Star for valor, a battlefield commission and what was called “battle fatigue” but has now been diagnosed as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
LG’s father stayed in the Army and also fought in Korea and survived a near massacre of his company by the Chinese. He hid under the bodies of his fellow soldiers and would spend six weeks trying to get back to the American lines after they were overrun.
He was reported missing in action (M.I.A.) but the family was later notified by phone that he had finally safely returned to his unit.
The demon of alcohol would not release its grip on Mr. Grizzard. It would follow him until his death in 1970, financially ruin him off and on, and result in a divorce from Christine.
Finally, he would periodically suffer from the depression that would lead him to run away from the Army and his family. The effects on LG were described as a “little boy wondering what sort of demon had taken his daddy away and had left his mother in tears.”
In 1982 LG wrote “They Tore Out My Heart and Stomped That Sucker Flat!” that contains more favorable comments about his father.
“My Daddy Was a Pistol and I’m a Son of a Gun!” was published in 1986 and was intended to tell the story about his aortic heart value replacements, his treatment in the hospitals, and his often wry sense of humor involving such essential acts as preparing for surgery by having all body hair removed by a male nurse that LG called “Dr. Prep.” Other descriptions of intrusions into his body by gloved hospital personnel are told in a way that causes laughter to the reader who have undergone the same medical procedures.
Yet he finds space in his book to affectionately share some personal and intimate facts about his father during the short years that they had intermittently shared together from 1947-1970. He visits some of his father’s weaknesses, including the recurring war nightmares, the divorce between his parents, alcoholism, etc.
Yet when his father died in LG’s presence from a medical diagnosis of respiratory failure due to pneumonia, his memory was what gave his son the courage needed to go through his first major heart surgery.
The act of LG going to the little cemetery where his father was buried a few days before the first aortic valve operation to visit his dad’s grave before the complicated operation demonstrated a final gesture of love to thank him personally for being Lewis’ natural parent.
(Happy Father’s Day, Lewis Grizzard, Sr.)
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You can reach Jerry Summers at jsummers@summersfirm.com)
Jerry Summers