FameCrawler : tim russert dies

Luke Russert's Loving Tribute To His Dad

Sassy Smith — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 02:40:00 GMT

A 22-year-old Luke Russert gives a very moving tribute to his late father Tim Russert. He had a quiet maturity about him and his speech was heartfelt, with humor, adoration, and obvious love and respect for his dad. I admire that he could laugh, remembering his father and all that he stood for, despite the pain he must be feeling and he held himself very well. Tim Russert would be very proud.

Video after the jump

Luke said, holding a partially filled glass of water, "For Tim Russert, his glass was always half-full.... In my 22 years, I've never met anybody filled with so much optimism... My dad was a force of nature, and now his own cycle in nature is complete.... I love you, Dad."

[Source]

Related Posts:

Tim Russert: The Lessons of Fatherhood

Obama Remembers Tim Russert

Tim Russert: The Lessons of Fatherhood

Karen — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 19:31:00 GMT

Lessons from a father are invaluable and lucky for us, Tim Russert shared his own experiences with his father, as well as a few as his role changed after son Luke was born.

In his book, Big Russ & Me, and the follow-up, Wisdom of Our Fathers, Tim shared some moments that will live on forever. Here are some excerpts:

All through my childhood, and well beyond it, my father held down two demanding jobs. But as hard as he labored and as long as he toiled, we never heard a single complaint about his heavy workload or the sacrifice he was making. He didn’t talk about it, he just got it done. And if he had to take a third job to support his wife and four kids, he would have done that, too ... like so many members of the strong, silent generation who grew up during the Great Depression and went off to war, he had learned long ago that life was hard and nothing was handed to you. In fact, Dad considered it a sign of success, and even a blessing, that he was able to hold down two jobs. He could remember a time when a man considered himself fortunate to have even one.

Russert's father, a war hero who rarely talked about his experiences during World War II, agreed to share one battle story with his son:

When I was in high school, the two of us were in the basement one day when Dad walked over to his desk, opened a drawer and took out a manila folder. He handed me a yellowed clipping from the October 27, 1944 edition of the Southport Weekly, an English newspaper. The headline read: US BOMBER CRASHES IN FLAMES IN AINSDALE, and the article described the crash of a B-24 Liberator at an Air Force Base in England. I read it quickly and zeroed in on the key lines: "When the plane crashed it broke up, and some of the airmen were thrown clear." Dad, I realized, had been one of them.

"This is amazing", I said.

He looked at me and said, "It was a lot tougher for the guys who died." Then he took back the clipping and put it away without another word. The conversation was over.

Russert's father never took a single sick day from his main job as a foreman for the sanitation department. Russert tried to pass that work ethic onto his own son, Luke:

On September 7, 1995, I took Luke, who was ten, to a baseball game at Camden Yards in Baltimore. [That was the night] Cal Ripken, Jr. was going to break Lou Gehrig's Iron Man record just by showing up and playing in his 2,131st consecutive game. This wasn't about something glitzy, like home runs ... I explained to my son that Cal Ripken's record was different from all the other records because this one was about loyalty, dedication, discipline, diligence and persistence.

I told Luke that night, and I meant it with all my heart, that Cal Ripken had done for baseball what my Dad had done for our family.

In Wisdom of Our Fathers, Russert wrote about his father's reaction to Big Russ & Me:

I always go to [my father's home] for Thanksgiving, and in 2004, a few months after the book came out, we were loading up the car to drive to the airport when Big Russ came over to me to say goodbye. For as long as I can remember, Dad and I had always parted with a handshake and a half hug. But this time he gave me a huge bear hug and he said softly, "I love you" – something I had never heard him say before. I was fifty four years old, and all I could think was, Boy, I wish I had written this book thirty years earlier.

Obama Remembers Tim Russert

Karen — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 17:32:00 GMT

The loss of Tim Russert certainly shook the world. He was loved by many, and while normally we reserve posts here at Famecrawler for celebrity parents, we thought it poignant to share something beautiful Obama said about the late journalist.

“We all I think have heard the news about Tim Russert. I’ve known Tim Russert since I first spoke at the convention in 2004. He’s somebody who overtime I came to consider not only a journalist but a friend.

"There wasn’t a better interviewer in TV, not a more thoughtful analyst of our politics and he was also one of the finest men I knew. Somebody who cared about America, cared about the issues, cared about family. I am grief-stricken with the loss and my thoughts and prayers go out to his family. And I hope that even though Tim is irreplaceable that the standard that he set in his professional life and his family life are standards that we all carry with us in our own lives.”

May Tim rest in peace.