May 26, 2003

Dear Dad,

I want to thank you Dad for being such a wonderful father to me, grandfather to my children, and great grandfather to my granddaughter. We all love you so very much. I know you are in a much better place now and are finally free of pain and are no longer suffering. It is very hard to go on without you here and I miss you terribly but I know we will one day be together again.  I wish I could have spent more time with you while you were here with us. I will always cherish our times together.  I always enjoyed talking with you. I want to thank you for all you taught me about the Catholic faith, I really learned a lot from you. I was so proud of you for all you did for others, you touched so many people. You taught me to love all of God’s children in this life and to never judge anyone. You taught me to be happy with the simple things in life. You taught me the true meaning of family and what it means to be loved unconditionally. I honestly cannot ever remember getting in to an argument with you even when I was a teenager. I am so grateful for that. I still can feel your love so strong even though I can no longer see you.

Thank you for being my Dad. I miss you so much

Love Donna Kay
 

April 9, 2004

Bobby,

This is Good Friday, two days before Easter Sunday.  Your two beautiful daughters Donna and Denise wrote you letter’s also. This is their way of trying to deal with their grief. I guess I must be doing the same thing because here I am.

 I know I used to write you a lot of letters when you were alive. Because that was the only way I knew to talk to you,  because you may talk to other people, but never to me through out our whole married life, 47 ½ years. I knew you for 48 years because we dated for six months. I guess you talked to me some, but not very much, most of the time you would tune me out.

It was true love for both of us at first sight Bobby, I know that.  When you walked in your Uncle’s Restaurant in Air Force uniform just back from the Korean War, my heart started pumping fast, I thought oh! What is this feeling?  And I know you felt the very same way because you sure didn’t waste anytime to get to know me, and you were so bashful.  It wasn’t but a day or two later, that I just had to meet your parents you said.  Then a couple days later, they take me to Liberty Campgrounds because you were camping by yourself for a week. You told them they had to bring me there for you to see. Then when the evening ended you tried to get them to leave me there with you and your mother said no way and they brought me back to Richmond.  Then after your 30 day leave was up, you have to leave for the Red Rock Mountain Air Force Base in the boon docks of Pennsylvania.  But you come back to see me every 11 days on a 90 hour pass by hitch hiking for 5 months until we got married.  Now if that isn’t true love what could it be?

We had plenty of ups and down’s thru out our marriage Bobby, but the good times made up for the bad times.  We have 4 wonderful children, we couldn’t have ever asked for any better.  We were very blessed (you said that many times) you thought you wasn’t a very good father at times and really regretted your younger life style, and I feel the same way. But they sure love us both any they totally forgive us if we done them any harm. So you can rest in peace on that OK?

Our grandchildren are wonderful. We have 1 dozen of them.  They all miss you a lot and love you.  Thomas is really giving us problems, he misses you so much. He says he is going to heaven on his vacation to see his Grandpa Benjamin, and he asks if they have McDonalds Restaurants in Heaven.

Our great grandchildren are wonderful all 8 of them, almost 9 Christi is due in September.  They all love you and miss you.  Destiny is having a hard time with your death too, like Thomas does.  She writes letters and says they are from you to her.  She brings me a present for you and me.  She sees you floating very low to the ground, she says you are not sick anymore and you look real good.

I guess I’m back tracking now. Chuck had a very rough year missing you.  He has carried a bullet casing from your grave ever since you died, not only in his race car but all the time in his pocket. (You are protecting him Bobby)  He misses you so much. So keep on being his guardian angel, flag them races and keep him safe.

Destiny has a shrine in her bedroom of memories of you, stuff I give her of yours.  Sherri Lynn brought me a beautiful flower plant and said it was for you, but I would have to keep it at Christmas.  I’m taking care of it.  They are all grieving for you in there own way.  They are very hurt and they love and miss you so much.

I gave Donald the American flag from your grave.  He is making a case for it and also putting your picture and medals from the Air Force in it.  He is also very upset about losing his father.

I sent Danny a flag also.  He is making a case for it. He was so happy to get it.  I really believe you are your whole family’s guardian angel.  (I know you keep me going – and protect me.) I feel your presence sometimes and dream sometimes about you but I don’t see your face. You told me I am a survivor and those words you said keeps me going.  I keep on hanging in there.  Sometimes I don’t know how, but I do.

I love you Bobby – Always and forever.

Marie
 
 

July 14, 2004

Dear Dad;

I miss you so much, I trust that you are no longer in pain. I think about you all the time. Hope you know that. Chuck put "In Loving Memory of Robert Benjamin" on his race cars. He still carries the bullet casing he got from the 21 gun salute, he says it helps him stay safe in his races. Destiny misses you very much also, I didn't realize how close she had gotten to you. I love you Dad, but you know that, right? I'm sorry for the times that I wasn't so nice to you, I feel really bad about those times now. I guess you don't realize how much you care about someone until they are gone and you can only hope and pray to see them again one day. I love you.

Denise

 
 
 

Dear Dad,

Well it’s been a year and a half since we said goodbye, but I still think of you often and miss you greatly.  We had our ups and downs over the years, but in our last years together I feel we got much closer and spent a lot of quality time together.  I am very grateful that you were able to come to Virginia and spend time with us for an extended length of time.  We had a lot of good times during that stay.  I remember when we went deep sea fishing together; we had such a good time.  You got the opportunity to come and work with me and I’ll never forget that.  I know you really wanted to stay in Virginia permanently to live near us and that meant so much to me.  I sure do miss you.  I miss talking to you about sports and everything on the phone on a regular basis.  I realize that you were suffering and we had to let you go, but it was still very hard to say goodbye.

Love you Dad,

Your son Donald
 

Dear Dad;

 I love you and miss you. I wanted to let you know that Chuck is going to be in a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Race on August 4th at IRP I know that you are looking down on all of us and helping God to keep us all safe. We are having a Surprise Birthday Party for Mom on Sunday July 30th. Donald and Danny are coming. Mom says that she wishes that you could be here to see Chuck make it into NASCAR and I tell her that you do see him and all of us. Every time I see a rainbow I tell everyone that you sent it to us. I love you Dad.

Love Denise