Rick Lerro, Dallas, 1955.
His new wife, Mirt, was starting the Household Employment Agency in an office at the corner of Elm and Lamar Streets. Rick joined Standard Brands as a maintenance man, responsible for keeping equipment running in a plant that produced Blue Bonnet and Fleischmann's Margarine. In addition to socializing with other plant employees, Rick joined the Fraternal Order of Eagles and the Veterans of Foreign Wars. For fund raisers, Rick usually volunteered his services to organize large Italian-themed spaghetti dinners. 

Dad had a burst of energy in December and early January. People around the nursing home noticed how animated he was, how happy he seemed to be, and how clear-thinking. He would roll himself up to the nursing station, slap the counter, and say “Bartender, I want a drink!” They would pour him a shot of brandy or wine and he would announce “Ahhhhh! That was good!” He would then roll himself away.

Then, around January 17^th, he came down with something. He stayed in bed, developed a fever, slept a lot, and started having trouble breathing. The following day the nursing home asked me and Jackie for permission to transfer him to a hospital. He was declining rapidly. I said, “No. Do your best. Keep him there in his home. A hospital would be frightening for him. You can do there whatever needs to be done.” We brought in a hospice team. I changed my ticket with American Airlines in order to fly out on a 6 a.m. flight from LaGuardia to Tyler. It was January 20^th. Jackie met me at the airport. We stopped for lunch in Tyler, then arrived at the nursing home around 3 p.m.

Dad was completely clean. He looked like he was in a deep sleep. His bed was elevated to help him breathe. He had an oxygen mask. He was struggling a bit and his respiration was irregular. We removed the mask. He licked the wet sponge Jackie held to his lips. I held his left hand and whispered, “I’m here Dad. You take it easy. You’re in no condition to go to the American Legion. You want to go out and get a beer? You have to rest a little.”

Jackie held his right hand. She put the mask back on his face. We held onto him for awhile.

Then he stopped breathing. We held his hands and looked at him, then at each other. We both started crying, and we put our heads on his chest. It was over. We were there together at the end, a father, a son, and a granddaughter.

He had waited for me. His last gift was that final hour, in his room, talking to him, holding his hand as he let go of 95 years of life. That was it.  

Arlington National Cemetery

Arlington National Cemetery

October 7, 2013

Richard Joseph Lerro will be inurned October 7, 2013, in Arlington National Cemetery.  The ceremony will include a flag presentation, a bugler, and a firing party. The 9 a.m. ceremony is open to anyone who wishes to attend.

Rick Lerro enjoyed a beer at Chuy's in Tyler, November 11, 2012.

Richard Joseph Lerro, 1918-2013

Rick Lerro died January 20, in Tyler, Texas, with family members by his side. The World War II veteran was preparing for his 95^th birthday at the time of his death. He witnessed most of the 20^th century, surviving perils in childhood and in war, brushing history in 1963, and “seeing half the world” on an 8^th grade education.

As a young boy he spent several years in an orphanage near Philadelphia. His grandmother, Justina Camarrota Lerro, found him and raised him in a family-owned butcher shop at 1024 South 9^th Street in Philadelphia’s Little Italy neighborhood. He attended Our Lady of Good Counsel School, completing the 8^th grade, and helped his uncles sell vegetables from carts in front of the butcher shop.

He married Caroline Fusco at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church in 1939 and had a son in 1941 while working at the Pennsylvania Shipyards.

During World War II Lerro served on a destroyer in the U.S. Navy’s Construction Battalion, the Sea Bees. He was stationed in the Philippines, Japan, and finally in Attu, Alaska, where he would occasionally wave to Soviet submariners who surfaced off the coastline to lie on deck sunning themselves.

He remained in the Navy Reserves, visiting Boston, Cuba, and Italy. Later in life he would say, “By the time I was 40 I had seen half the world.”

After the Navy, while serving as a Harris County Sheriff’s Deputy in Houston, he met another young divorcee, Myrtle Lee Metcalf. He liked Italian operas. She preferred country music. They wed in 1955 and moved to Dallas where they had a son in 1958. Myrtle launched the Household Employment Agency and Rick worked as a maintenance man for Standard Brands Foods and St. Regis Paper Company. He remained a part-time butcher throughout his adult life.

In the early 1960s the Lerros were featured in Life magazine when their pet alligators got loose and roamed their Dallas neighborhood. Dallas soon passed an exotic pets ordinance.

In 1963 he and his wife were interviewed by FBI agents following the Kennedy assassination after agents discovered that the Lerros were close friends and business associates of Jack Ruby, who shot and killed Lee Harvey Oswald. While in prison Ruby corresponded with the Lerros, once writing that his murder of Oswald was a spur of the moment decision and not pre-meditated.

In 1968 Lerro was diagnosed with colorectal cancer which was surgically removed and never returned.

Lerro’s first marriage to Caroline Fusco ended in divorce, however, the two remained friends until her death.

Richard Joseph Lerro is preceded in death by his wife of 52 years, Myrtle Lerro. He is survived by sons Richard Joseph Lerro, Jr. and his wife Judy of West Palm Beach, Fla., and Richard Marcus Lerro and his spouse Terrence Onderick of Washington, D.C., his granddaughter and caretaker, Jackie Cannon and her husband Kyle of Tyler, Texas. His surviving grandchildren are Robert Lerro and his wife Cheryl, and Julie Williams and husband Lawrence of Florida, Stephen Lerro and wife Phylis of Tennessee, and Ashley David Harmon and wife Rachel of Texas. Great grandchildren include Jonathan Cannon, Michael Cannon, Karl Cannon, Mason Harmon, Jacob Harmon, Ashlyn Harmon, Billie Lerro, Tyler Williams, Brianna Williams, Aaron Lerro, Corey Lerro, Sarah Lerro, Collin Lerro, and Kathryn Lerro.  Great-great grandchildren include Siearra Cannon and Cauline Cannon, and surviving his son-in-law is Jerry Powell of San Augustine.

A private wake is planned for the residents and staff of Providence Park Rehabilitation Center in Tyler. A private funeral mass is planned at St. Boniface Catholic Church in Chandler, Texas.

Canton, Texas, First Monday