I knew Harry from first grade, when we all wore close-cropped hair and innocent smiles and sat at the small wooden desks with a little hole in the corner where something called an ink well used to be.
We happily listened to Mrs. Stoker teach us about A, B and C, thinking those were the important things. We didn’t know that the reality of life is to grow up and then die, sometimes even though you’re only in middle age. That’s what Harry did.
It was cancer, and it strung him along. He was a kind, good man, and he didn’t complain much. He got back into church when he got sick, and that makes me feel better. He wasn’t sure if he could beat it but he told me he was going to try. It seemed strange, after only having crossed paths on occasion as adults that we had to talk about such difficult things.

Harry never asked me for anything. Not until the end, but I didn’t know it was the end.

Harry had lots of difficult things. A difficult marriage. A difficult job situation. Other stuff. What wasn’t difficult was his passion for working on race cars, even when it cost him money, or cost him a job every now and then. See, Harry wasn’t into big-time racing; oh, he’d watch it on TV and long to be wearing the bright crew uniforms on Sunday afternoon, but his place was at the short tracks, places like Anderson and Mt. Lawn and Winchester, and later Shady Bowl and Salem and IRP.
Guys like Harry make racing happen, because they’re free labor. They fix the broken parts, hammer out the dents, load the truck, carry the fuel, and listen to the driver point out all the things that kept him from winning. They shiver in the rain one week, and the next week they get sunburned and heat stroke. They’re overlooked and overworked, and they still come back next week.
Harry never asked me for anything. Not until the end, but I didn’t know it was the end. He never wanted to borrow money, or borrow my car or stay at my house. He didn’t ask me to write an article about a friend of his or ask me to get him tickets for a NASCAR race.
But a few months ago he called me on the phone. Harry was already sick; he had been dealing with a tumor in his stomach for more than a year. But that wasn’t why he was calling. He asked me to try to help his kid.
Some really tough things happened to Harry during his life. His situation was right along the lines of a book I read some years ago: “When Bad Things Happen to Good People,” or something like that. Harry was a good guy; I never once knew of him lying or hurting anyone. If you needed his shirt you wouldn’t have to ask twice. If he saw somebody struggling with a problem, he would try to help even if they didn’t ask. Harry really was “good people.”
Harry had a son — his name is Chase — who is now 15. A few years ago, Chase rode his bike across a busy street, even though Harry had cautioned him to stay off the highway. He didn’t see the car that hit him, but when he woke up, the doctors said things would be different from then on. Chase had a spinal injury. They said he was lucky he still had some movement of his hands.
It’s hard to be in a wheelchair. For a man, for a woman, for anyone. But for a 12-year-old kid, well, they see other kids running and playing and riding bikes and probably get to wondering why things like this happen. And it’s hard on moms and dads, too. Harry said it was tough to hold the boy’s hand while he cried, because dad couldn’t make it better.
That’s why Harry was calling me last November. Chase lives with his mom, and the family didn’t have the money to make their house handicapped-accessible. Truth is, Harry was broke. He hadn’t worked in a while because of the cancer, and money was, well, just not there.
He wasn’t asking me for money. He made that very plain. But he wondered if maybe I knew some big-time NASCAR drivers with a charitable foundation who might help out. Harry explained that Chase is now a teen-age boy, and the only way he can bathe is to have his mother help him onto a seat in the shower. This was okay a couple of years ago, but when he takes his clothes off and his mother has to help him into the shower, well, that’s really weird for a 15 year old.
Harry figured that if he could just build a shower that would accommodate Chase’s wheelchair, it would help the boy’s situation immensely. He found a group from Ball State University (American Institute of Architectural Students, or AIAS) who would provide all the labor, but Harry and the family had to buy all the supplies and fixtures. This was way beyond their resources, Harry explained.
I told him I’d try. And I did. I made a few phone calls, but discovered that most racing foundations will donate autographed items you can raffle or sell, but they aren’t equipped to do cash donations. I explained this to Harry, and told him I’d keep thinking about the issue and try to come up with something else.
In the meantime, the holidays came. We all got busy, and Harry’s phone number sat on my desk alongside 50 other things to follow-up on.
A few weeks ago I was visiting my mom. She still lives in our home town, and she keeps me up to date on things.
“It’s a shame about Harry Hemme, isn’t it?” she said.
“What about him?”
“Oh, he died…didn’t you see it in the paper?”
I had a double dose of feeling rotten. It’s very sad to lose a friend, no matter the circumstances. But with Harry, I felt like there was unfinished business. Maybe I let him down. Because he died without being able to help his son reclaim a bit of dignity, a son who is paying the rest of his life for a simple kid mistake.
I got another phone call today. It was one of the students at Ball State. They’re still trying to figure a way to upgrade Chase’s house, and build that shower. They’ve scheduled a fund-raising raffle and bowling tournament — Chase and Harry used to like to go bowling together — for later this month. The girl was calling me, wondering if I’d like to come.
I’ll be there, Harry. You’re gone, but you’re not forgotten.

To donate items or funds to AIAS to benefit Chase Hemme, send to:
Brianna Newton
FBD Fundraising Chair
622 N. Martin Ave. #4
Muncie, Ind.  47303
bfnewton@gmail

The Chase Hemme raffle and bowling outing is scheduled for 2 p.m. Sunday, March 29 at the Liberty Bowl, 1115 S. Liberty St. in Muncie, Ind.