Jack Eugene Plummer - My Big Brother

Jack is the son of Charles and Shirley Hoover Plummer.  He was born in Richmond, Indiana on July 22, 1939.  Jack was 15 years older than me so I don't remember him except as a man.  I don't remember him living at home, in my memory he was always married to Della Hahn who I called Sis.  In actuality they were

married January 23, 1960, when I was five years old.  

Jack was an avid outdoors man   He was a hunter, a fisherman, he rode horses, and he water skied. He loved cars.  He was always busy and involved in something.  I remember how excited he was when he got his first deer.  He also raced stock cars. There was a race track somewhere east of Connersville, Indiana, where he would race stock cars on the weekend during the summer.

  

Jack was a sheet metal worker and he worked for Triangle Sheet Metal, in Connersville, for many years.  He was the owner's right hand man, and head foreman.  

Jack and Sis would take the take me to their house to stay a lot.  They also took my two brothers and my younger sister. We were still living at home with mom and dad.  They would take all of us fun places and do things with us.  It was  like having an aunt and uncle who had no children.  They would spoil us.  I know he taught my brothers how to do lots of things.  Dad wasn't very well by this time and was unable to do a lot of things.  We got to do those things with Jack.  

Jack had a dog that was very close to him.  His dog, Belle, was left at home one time when they were gone and someone tried to get in.  Belle tore up a lot of things in the house.  They couldn't leave her inside any more because she would get nervous and tear things up.  They started chaining her outside when they left.  She broke several chains.  Sometimes she would get to our house before they did.  We knew he would be coming around soon when she would be standing at our front door.  She was a great dog.  She just didn't want to stay at home when they were gone.

Jack and Sis had always wanted children of their own.  They were unable to have them.  They decided to adopt but it was difficult to find children to adopt and they didn't think it was going to happen.  My brother that was just a little younger than Jack was having problems raising his children.  He and his wife decided to allow Jack and Sis to adopt the baby they were going to have.  They had a little girl in July 1974.  Jack and Sis adopted her.

Jack bought a boat the in the summer of 1974.  He was out in the boat almost every weekend.  It was getting to be late summer and I had gone to Connersville to see mom and dad.  Jack came by and said he was going out on the boat and asked if we wanted to go.  My husband, my mom, my daughter and I had gone out the weekend before.  We decided not to go and told him to have fun.  A little while later we headed home which was a couple of hours away.  When I walked into my house the phone was ringing.  It was mom calling to tell me that my brother had died on the lake that afternoon.  He drowned at Brookville Lake.  He was 35 years old.  Brookville Lake had been opened to boaters for the first time that summer.  He was the first drowning in the lake.  Jack died on August 26, 1974.   His daughter was one month old.  Jack  is buried at Dale Cemetery in Connersville, Indiana.