Sitting around a campfire sharing significant musical memories, I reflected back to high school.  It  was June , 1964 and Bruce and I were juniors in high school.  He asked me if I wanted to go to a rock concert in Detroit and most definitely I did.  Setting the scene, remember that we all went to a small Catholic high school and a big night out was going to one of our school dances or the movie.  Bruce was such a gifted person, not only his writing but his quest for life and the ability to challenge the norms of the time.  He wanted to go see The Rolling Stones who were going to be in Detroit on their first United States tour.  Like any star struck teenage girl at the time,  I only saw these groups on The Ed Sullivan Show.  But to see The Stones in person!  I just knew there was no way my parents would allow me to drive all that way to a big city with a boy alone in a car and no less to a rock concert.  When I finally got up the nerve to ask permission my Mom replied, that yes she would talk to my Dad and I could go because Bruce  "was such a nice young man".

It was a rainy day on June 14, 1964 when we set off for Detroit.  The Stones were not wildly popular and that well known yet but Bruce somehow knew what superstars they would become.  We arrived at  Olympia  Stadium, which was not exactly in the best part of town.  The Olympia was the home of the Red Wing Hockey team, red brick on the outside and wooden construction inside.  Bruce had splurged and spent $4 to buy us the best seats available.  We sat on those old fashioned wooden folding chairs in about the 4th row on the floor, middle seats right near the stage.  Bruce was quite proud of the seats he selected.  Mick was about 20 at the time.  They were amazing and Mick was an explosion of energy and athletic feats.  He jumped off the stage into the row in front of us, landing on a chair and then picked up another and proceeded to smash it to bits! How were Bruce and I to know the legend The Stones would become.  There were about 500 people in attendance.

 I was saddened to hear of his unexpected death.  Reading of his life, I see that he had a wonderful wife, daughters and grandchildren and that he lived his beliefs and convictions.  My deepest condolences to his family.  Bruce was a legend of his own.

My Dad by Tess Miller (speech from his Celebration of Life)

It’s been a long time coming, but after much deliberation over whether my Dad would or wouldn’t want a gathering such as this, the decision for me was based on one tiny detail about my Dad’s life.

My Dad was a consummate funeral/memorial service attendee. Every other time I talked to him, it seemed that among the things he recounted from his day, there was usually a service for a friend, a relative, or a colleague on his list. In fact, when we were going through some of his old coats, there was, of course, a program from a service he’d been to shortly before he died.

“Why was that,” I always wondered. I’ll likely never know a definitive reason. However, I surmise that it boils down to ritual. My Dad through action demonstrated a love of ritual. Among his daily rituals included his daily walk, his carefully crafted cup of coffee, his drive to Horrocks for another $60 free cup of coffee and then to visit the Aunts & Uncles in St. Joseph cemetery.

It was the tiny rituals that he followed, and then there were the bigger rituals, like attending Celebrations of Life like these. And so, I decided that for someone who seemed intent on being a witness among witnesses for these kinds of services, I thought it would be nice to give others the opportunity to show up and share memories of him.

We are going to start with a Fanfare by Aaron Copland played by the Durant Street Winds. 

Here’s some background on this piece from an NPR article:

In 1942, Copland was commissioned by the music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra to write a fanfare. The U.S. had entered World War II, and then-Vice President Henry A. Wallace was trying to rally Americans against imperialism. Copland was inspired by a speech Wallace gave that spring at the Free World Association in New York City.

"Some have spoken of the American Century," Wallace proclaimed. "I say that the century on which we are entering, the century which will come out of this war, can be and must be the century of the common man." Copland would later echo that sentiment himself, saying, "It was the common man, after all, who was doing all the dirty work in the war and the army. He deserved a fanfare."

If you knew my Dad, you knew that he celebrated all kinds of “common” people, through his career, through the way he took time to get to know people. And he did whatever he could to uplift anyone. He believed that everyone deserved a chance at a good life.

And so, in honor of my Dad, and in honor of his service to others, it is only fitting that my quintet, the Durant Street Winds, play the Fanfare for the Common Man by Aaron Copland.

Memories of Bruce Miller by David Dornan

When I moved to Michigan in 1977 to work for the Michigan Department of Public Health I had to give up the mountain environment I had known all my life. Raised in the Jackson Hole Wyoming and attending colleges in Colorado and California, I was ill prepared to live in the flat lands of Michigan. It wasn’t until I saw Bruce, who was at that time working at the State Health Department, reading a book about Mt. Everest, that I told him that I had been a professional mountain climber, and if he was interested in adventures, I would take him climbing.

This short encounter led to years of adventures with Bruce on many rock crags as well as mountains in western America and Canada. We also did a lot of running road races together and competing in the Detroit marathon. His favorite race was a 15 miler in Grand Rapids that we did together many times. On this race we ran through a little town called Wyoming, a name that had special meaning to both of us. Bruce’s father was from the state of Wyoming and I was born in Jackson Wyoming.

We started doing rock climbing on a sandstone cliff in Grand Ledge that was not far from where Bruce lived. We brought Bruce Bragg and Bob Glandon into our group and started taking trip into Ontario to climb on the limestone cliffs of the Niagara Escarpment. Later we took extended trips to Seneca Rock in West Virginia, the Shawangunks in New York, the Red River Gorge in Kentucky and Devil’s Lake in Wisconsin. All of these areas had highly developed climbing areas that allowed us to increase our competence on steep difficult rock. We had many good adventures on these trips. In Ontario, Bruce once fell off the rock and we had to take him in town to get treated. In Kentucky our campsite got flooded in a rainstorm, and in New York we took a day off from climbing to visit FDR’s home in Hyde Park. All of the climbs we did were classical routes in the annuals of American climbing.

In summers we took several trips West to explore and climb the mountains of Colorado, Wyoming, California and Alberta Canada. In all of these trips Bruce was a loyal member and happily participated in all of the hair brained activities I suggested. In the Tetons, I had everyone climb the Grant Teton in one day. This meant ascending a 13,750 ft high alpine peak from a 6,300 ft start and a seven mile approach to do technical roped climbing at high altitude. The next few days after the Grand Teton I had everyone compete in difficult mountain trail races. Talk about a group of wiped out people! In California we did a similar rock climb on Mt. Whitney, but Bruce and his rope-mate had to spend a very cold night on the summit since it was too dark for them to descend. On the 22-mile long approach to Mt Gannet in Wyoming, Bruce had to ford cold, deep mountain streams in the dark to reach our campground site.

All of these experiences and more, like floating the Salmon River in Idaho, created a friendship that made us brothers in adventures and any crazy idea we could come up was worth trying. Thank you, Bruce, you made Michigan a much better place for me, and I miss you very much.

For Bruce by Sue Allen

If I were to die on my morning walk

I’d leave the house quietly, stroke my cat

Blow a kiss to my spouse

All unaware I’d never return

Who knows what dangers lie inside us, the ticking bombs and booby traps

That may explode anywhere, anytime

I’d head out, my gait a little stiff, but at a respectable pace for one my age.

And greet the new spring morning with a grin

The main actor in the sun’s early spotlight

If I were to die on my morning walk

I’d like to know my affairs were in order

My mind at peace, my family equipped to live without me

I would miss them, as dearly as they’d miss me

But I would want them to know, things could be worse, much worse

Than ending this journey doing what I loved so,

Moving forward and beyond, walking

Remembering Bruce Miller by Joanne Pohl

(speech during the Celebration of Life)

I, along with our adult children, Amy and David have been reflecting and talking a lot on Bruce’s life—initially a year ago after learning of Bruce’s very untimely death and periodically over the year and again more intensely this past week-- remembering the wonderful relationship our two families developed over almost 40 years.

That seems impossible—the 40 years part.

When we moved to Lansing in 1986, it turned out to be a very difficult move, especially for me. I had left a job/practice I loved in Detroit and had accepted a position at MSU as faculty but was looking for a primary care practice to accompany my faculty position in the College of Nursing. In 1987, I learned of Federal funding (which continues today) for Health Care for the Homeless and approached my faculty director at MSU about pulling together a group of interested “parties” in Lansing, especially the Health Department. That is how I met Bruce Miller. He agreed to have the Ingham Health Department take the lead on this funding, and he and I wrote the grant, and it was funded. By the way, that little store front clinic is now a larger Federally Qualified Health Center, thanks to Bruce Miller.

Bruce, not really knowing me, totally trusted my input and advice on what might be needed from a clinical and nursing perspective; I gained a meaningful practice where I could bring student NP students with me.

It was soon after that that our two families connected. I will say more about that in a bit.

What I learned and respected about Bruce over those years was his unwavering commitment to the underserved and uninsured. He also had my back during a couple of difficult clinic situations. One was a young woman, probably 18 or younger, who came to the clinic for a pregnancy test, a pregnancy she did not want. I spent a lot of time with her to discuss her options after she heard the test was positive and she left thinking she would get an abortion. The next day, when I was not in clinic, she called with more questions and the physician was there. Another nurse overheard their conversation and was very disturbed and told me about it. The physician basically confronted the patient and made it clear she should not be making this decision. The nurse who overheard the call said she could tell that the woman was very distressed. We never saw the woman again. When I told Bruce about this and what appeared to be a major violation of professional ethics, Bruce said he would talk with the physician and agreed it was not the way the Health Department wanted to be treating patients. What I didn’t know, until Bruce told me later, was that he fired the physician. I was surprised, but I should not have been, knowing Bruce.

In “retirement” Bruce had a huge impact on expanding the County Health Plans that provided what some of us called “Medicaid light” to some of the uninsured who did not qualify for Medicaid or any other insurance. I believe out of 80 some counties in Michigan, around 75 or more eventually had these plans, and much of that expansion was due to Bruce’s working with a lot of counties.

Then when our families became connected, I remember family dinners, trips to Mackinac Island, first in the judge’s home where Roger, my late husband, learned to make stuffed grape leaves with Bruce’s mom, Mimi, and then visits to the wondrous home you built on the Island, including that very special 2000 New Year’s. Such wonderful memories. Then Bruce traveled with Roger to Honduras with students from UM during alternative Spring Break. I was on some of those trips as well, and it was clear Bruce was touched in a special way by those experiences.

How can I forget your wedding Tess, when “someone” spilled red wine on your wedding dress. Sue and I were talking with you Tess if I remember. Sue thought she had bumped your hand which spilled the wine. We all rushed into the women’s bathroom to literally pour club soda on your dress. I think it was some weeks after your wedding when I received an email from Bruce, and in the subject line it read “It was you”. And then in the email he humorously told me about the video confirming the culprit. That was his marvelous sense of humor. And to your credit Tess, you handled that situation with amazing grace and enjoyed the rest of the reception (along with the rest of us). And Amanda, as you were planning your wedding I jokingly said to you “I suppose I might not be invited to your wedding after what happened at Tess’s. With your quick wit (like your Dad’s) you said something like “Oh of course you are invited; we will just serve only white wine.” Oh, the richness of stories remembered.

In talking with our “children” Amy and David over the last weeks, they remembered Bruce “ wonderful friend of our family who was both brilliant and witty”. Roger and I shared so much of life with Sue and Bruce, over the years. I cherish all those times and memories and am deeply aware of the sense of gratitude for such significant friendships as well as the deep sense of loss when we lose a significant friend like Bruce.

I will close with a few lines from Mary Oliver’s poem, which I found comforting: When Death Comes especially the last line:

When death comes like the hungry bear in autumn; (only for Bruce it was Spring

when death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

(there are many more lines that I did not use); it was the final line that I found most profound.

When death comes, I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.”

Bruce is someone who did not simply “visit” this world. He lived in it fully and his life had a huge impact not only on his family and friends but on the health of so many, especially the many unnamed, marginalized and underserved in Michigan. I know you want this to be a celebration of life and there is certainly so much to celebrate.

Joanne Pohl

Remembering the extraordinary life of my cousin by Chris Haddad 

(speech give during the Celebration of Life)

Every once in a while there comes a person who everyone wants to listen to, or everyone is inspired by or everyone wants to be like. To me, Bruce was that kind of person. There’s no way I can stand up here and do justice to the extraordinary life of my cousin, but I can leave you with a small part of the impact he made on me.

My name is Chris Haddad. I am one of Bruce’s roughly 300 or so cousins. I only count 300 cousins because I always thought our family started with Grandma Haddad, Because Grandma Martha Haddad was the oldest living relative I have ever known. Our Grandparents immigrated here in 1913. Our Grandfather Frank died before Bruce and I were born. Bruce was one of the oldest of our generation and I was one of the youngest coming right before the once removed and 2nd cousins.

I’m not really here to talk about Bruce’s career but he was a very well respected and accomplished professional in his field. The success he had in making the communities he served better, was really a testament to his humble beginnings. At the time Bruce was born, our family had only been in this country for 33 years. He was raised by his mother and surrounded by a close knit group of Aunts and Uncles who all lived nearby. My father, Bruce's Uncle Charlie was always particularly fond of Bruce. My Dad must have been very proud of him even at a young age, because my brother was given Bruce's middle name. Later in life my Dad and Bruce, both forward thinkers, would discuss things that they thought would make the world a better place, like the possibility of hydrogen powered cars, better ways to make car tires and politics…they shared similar views. It makes perfect sense to me that Bruce was one of the first to buy an electric car.

I wish we could turn back the clock. But how far? To last year? To 5 years ago when Bruce and Sues summers on Mackinaw Island seemed like they would last forever? To when Pheonix and Jasper were born? To when Amanda and Tess were born? To when Bruce and Sue got married? Earlier then that?

Some of my earliest recollections were family dinners at our Grandma’s yellow house on Ray Street. The time was in the 1960’s. My Aunt Mimi who was Bruce’s mother and one of the classiest women I had ever known, and our Grandma Haddad would host Sunday dinner. Along with the help of my mother and our aunts, the mulrahbea, kibbee and Syrian bread would magically appear. I don't know how often we got together but it was so much fun that it seemed to me like it was every Sunday…even though I know it wasn’t.

Grandma’s house was moved from someplace else… I think it was originally located on main street but I’m not really sure where from. Bruce knew. He knew because he was our family historian. I think he was truly in awe of the decision our grandparents made to traverse across the ocean in search of the American dream. He traced our families immigration from the old country, through Ellis Island and then to Lansing. He researched our ancestry, wrote about everything good in our family….and some bad stuff that I never really knew about. Nothing real bad, … but funny bad stuff. I was just reading a copy of the book he wrote that Aunt Em has on her coffee table. It’s the one entitled “Once upon a time in Lansing”. It has newspaper articles, family history, and like I said alot of family stuff I never knew about.

Well anyway, the house on Ray Street was the place that had a park right behind it. We got to the park through the back yard where there was an opening in the fence. I think they tried to close it up by putting a pipe in the ground so you couldn’t get through…but we got through it. Sneaking through the fence was one of the best things about visiting there on Sundays. And Bruce got to live there!

I remember our Grandma Haddad was the greatest slap jack card player that ever lived! That’s right…She never won a game. We won every time we played her. And Bruce got to live with her! I always believed that Grandma packed his school lunch every day with Fatiya and Easter cookies. I mean who gets so lucky that they get to live with their grandma!

Bruce was cool. He was a little older then me, and he was someone I looked up to. I remember when he went off to college. Not everyone got to go to college back then but Bruce worked hard to get there. In college he met a girl. She was so pretty … and that made him look even cooler to me. And of course, Bruce even got to marry her! What a perfect couple Bruce and Sue were. I remember visiting them in I think it was in Stephensville Michigan on our way back from Iowa in the early 70's. I can't remember if Amanda and Tess were born yet, but what a great impression to leave on a younger cousin. Their life together has been full of adventures and accomplishments.

So what I’m trying to say about turning back the clock is that anywhere you may have chosen…. they were all the best of times. I know Bruce looked back on his childhood with the fondest of memories. He was extremely proud of his heritage. He was so happy to be married to Sue. He was so proud of his children and grandchildren. And to top it all off, he knew how much you all loved him.

I swear Bruce crammed 100 years of living into his 76 years. Bruce and Sue raised a remarkable family together. They bought a cottage on Mackinac Island that has become such a special place for everyone to gather. Bruce ran marathons and climbed mountains. That American dream that our Grandparents came looking for? Well Bruce certainly found it.

Bruce by Steve O'Leary (speech during the Celebration of Life)

I was fortunate enough to have met Bruce twice. First, we were grade school pals at St. Mary’s for 6 years. Kids those days were more feral than today’s- no play dates. We freely roamed the streets of Lansing after school and weekends. His mom worked at the Capitol, so between 3 and 5, we discovered the city. We knew most of the staff at the Capitol, including the shoeshine guy, the state librarian, and a maintenance supervisor with a lone desk, far in a remote corner of the sub-basement. We went to high floors of the Capitol which were closed to the public to drop airplanes and parachutes from the top of the dome. We knew which buildings downtown had the best escalators and the fastest elevators.

One day, after filching a tiny turtle from the pet department in Woolworth’s basement, we chucked him out the 15th floor window in the Bank of Lansing to see if reptiles really would evolve into birds. And he did! Flying off as I recall in the direction of Michigan Ave.

Further scientific study took place on St. Mary’s playground, where finding a loose brick in the rectory garage, we inserted a banana peel to see if it would petrify like the petrified forest wood described in our textbook. And sure enough, after a few months, it was black and hard as stone.

Bruce was my favorite person, introducing me to Mad Magazine, our Bible which I’m sure contributed to my future inclination to question authority. He was always a step ahead absorbing culture. While others were spouting silly jump rope limericks involving “greasy grimy gopher guts,” he memorized the lyrics from The Music Man tune called “Ya got trouble with a capital T that rhymes with P and stands for pool.” I was duly impressed.

Weekends were for sleepovers and trips to Gladmer, the Capitol, of the Michigan theaters, depending on who had the double feature monster movies or Disney hits.

I really missed our times together when I moved away in middles school. He was the best friend I’d ever had. THEN LIFE HAPPENED.

Fast forward 50 or 60 years- while perusing a Lansing historical page on Facebook, asking if anyone remembered or had photos of my old neighborhood, Bruce pipes up, “Yes. I remember coming to your house for lunch and your mother made Fried Milkweed!”

And we were off- almost like no time had passed at all- meeting up, texting, taking trips. For the next 9 years, I got to know Bruce all over again. Always thoughtful, considerate, and frank about his views and concerns. We had many discussions on current affairs, philosophy, and all things Tesla. He always researched and thought things through, but never talked down to anyone. I could see how he had attained a position of leadership at the Health Department.

I once witnessed him at work. After retiring from the Health Department, he was leading a group who were bringing affordable health insurance to an underserved northern county of the state.

We had been at Mackinac that weekend, and he had an organizational meeting in Traverse City Monday morning. He would be late, so the meeting began on schedule as we drove while he sat in via speaker phone. As with any occupation or discipline, a great deal of jargon was flying among the staff, mostly well over my head, but when Bruce chimed in with his opinion, it was in plain English, without malice, and redirected the conversation from the weeds back to the real objective. He had that way with people- the ability to correct on a meaningful level so they still felt seen and heard.

Once in early spring, when they were readying the Grand Hotel for spring opening, I watched him carry on a friendly conversation in the lobby with a hotel director of some sort that resulted in us being allowed full, unaccompanied access to every room in the vacant hotel. We freely toured every guest room, dining room, and bar for the next few hours, just because he knew how to treat people.

One of his final texts was to let me know that Al Jaffee, Mad Magazine’s cartoon Maestro, the last of the original staff members, had died at 102. I responded, “the last of his kind. I guess that means we’re also getting close to the front of the line.”

His response was 3 words- “What, me worry?”

In conclusion, I urge you to order his book on Amazon. It’s a wonderful legacy especially for his family. Bruce managed to piece together through newspaper, bank archives, and interviews a take of heroism and love for fellow human beings, an appropriate legacy for a man who helped so many people of Michigan in so many ways. It is called “Once Upon a Time in Lansing,” published on Flying Turtle Press.