Remembrance of a fine, fun person

 

Bill Knight column for 12-14, 15 or 16, 2020

 One of the many tragedies in the pandemic is being unable to say goodbye to terminally ill family or friends hospitalized in isolation, where lives slip away.

That lack of closure also occurs when someone dies unexpectedly, a seemingly unique yet actually universal experience for most folks.

Passing away Dec. 3, 83-year-old Don Daudelin was the kind of person who’d always pick up a conversation where it paused last week or last century – somehow not dwelling on the past. In some ways he was a “savior,” a noun at which the long-time pastor undoubtedly would bristle and grin behind his beard. But for 30 years at Western Illinois University, he was instrumental in saving student government, saving the student newspaper, and saving more than a few of us from ourselves.

“A great guy who helped save our butts,” said a former newspaper editor, one of about 50 who expressed grief and appreciation for Daudelin hours after the sad news.

A former student advocate (first called “ombudsman” when appointed in 1970) who’d been a Campus Crusade for Christ minister since 1965, he not only was an advocate and influence, he officiated at countless weddings and baptisms and offered condolences when losses struck. With Father Kelly, Father Real and conscientious faculty, Daudelin earned students’ trust by defending us and often seeking and finding common ground in disagreements.

He wasn’t exactly a mentor for most, though he guided an energetic collection of characters pushing for student rights and against the Viet Nam War, like a lot of campuses then: Catholic Worker Jane and Socialist Worker Greg, Students for a Democratic Society, Black Students Association, theater people and undergrads studying business, education, psychology and more. A political and spiritual adviser of sorts, he offered a reasoned voice and an understanding ear: a fine, fun human being. (Somewhere I have a photo of us at a meeting, him smiling holding a curved-stem pipe and me smiling holding a kazoo.)

After National Guard troops in 1970 shot protestors at Kent State, WIU students took over the ROTC building for days, and as police assembled nearby, Daudelin brokered a compromise with the hundreds of students still occupying the building: “He was a help to us at the time of the takeover,” an activist remembered with some understatement.

Daudelin himself was mild, too, suggesting some path forward or ways out of situations that seemed hopeless, heartless or destined for danger or violence. He was a towering figure who physically wasn’t imposing. (One English major described him as a wise Hobbit; a campus editor sent a distraught woman facing expulsion to Daudelin: “See the gnome in the student union office; he’ll be your best bet. And your best friend.”)

Through decades as a retiree, he would freely gab as he staffed the counter at a local newsstand and cigar shop, usually asking about others instead of recounting his own achievements and adversities.

Among others’ many comments – from administrators and educators, print and radio journalists, a retired cop, photographer, ex-lawmaker, clergyman, Army officer, and activists – were a few apt lines: “a fine, gentle man,” “a super, super, good man,” “ a nice guy,” “RIP, sweet gent…”

Praise as low-key and earnest as he was.

It’s typical to long for some final farewell, maybe it’s human nature to just always want more. I sure wish there was another Sunday afternoon to share a few amusements, amazements, outrages and a little more life with such a memorable man.