Rolfs Bench | The River Reporter

By CHRISTOPHER FREY

BARRYVILLE, NY – The Upper Delaware River weighs heavily on the heart of anyone who has rappelled down a rapid, pulled a tenacious shad from a rocky bottom, or simply gazed at its green-edged beauty from Barryville’s Bluff or Hawk’s Nest. and the mind.

For Rolf Beckhusen, one of the boys of mid-20th century Barryville, even his eventual move to the country’s far left coast never diminished his love for his hometown and his gray stucco riverfront house with its broken fence and gorgeous acres. a few kilometers from our upstream village.

He didn’t come back from Bellingham, WA often, but he always checked in with his boyhood friends and looked for news of classmates, neighbors and Wiffleball fans. As she practiced small-town law, raised her children, and honed her softball and ping-pong skills, her thoughts were never far from Barryville, Eldred Central School, and her (mostly) idyllic teenage years in the prime of the Boomertimes. Rolf’s greatest joy? The Delaware River – his perfect backyard.

Rolf left us in 2022 – his big German-American heart could not withstand the challenges of several serious illnesses – and he died in February at the age of 77. His Barryville friends wanted to remember Rolf in a meaningful way, and several of us decided to create a permanent memorial at the site of the Beckhusen family home.

However, change is constant, and the home and land had been sold years ago after Rolf’s parents also migrated west to live their last years near him in Washington. We quickly realized that Kittatinny Campground now owned the site and that we needed to contact the new owners whose feet had barely touched the ground in Barryville to see what they thought about erecting a memorial bench on their property.

Brian Czarnecki, head of the parent company, was the first person we took the request to. To our delight, Brian was immediately on board. In another conversation, he had looked up Rolf’s obituary and commented on what a fine person he seemed. Brian and Rocco Baldassari, the local general manager, quickly decided where the plot should be—right on the downstream edge of the footprint of the Beckhusen family home—and the wheels turned.

Bill Bosch, a classmate of Rolf’s, decided that Lackawaxen Bluestone was a suitable medium for the bench, and he and several friends were happy to pay for it. Kittatinny’s maintenance team prepared the place and installed a bench and a commemorative plaque for everyone to see and enjoy.

A celebration of Rolf’s life was held in Bellingham in June 2022, and as we gazed in awe at the tables full of awards he had collected over the years from his youth sports teams and adult softball teams, we shared the first photos of the memorial bench. With Rolf’s family and friends. On the weekend of May 19, Rolf’s daughter Lisa Aspessi and her husband James, both Bellingham police officers, made the pilgrimage to Barryville for their brothers Josh and Zac. They enjoyed the bench, planted perennials, and made their way down Dad’s river past the former Beckhusen homestead.

Between a few tears, Lisa said: “James and I had a really moving experience being on the river. I see now what led Dad to Deming, Washington, where my brother and I grew up on a river in a small town.”

He thanked the Kittatinny team for their gracious gift to the family. When a new business in town recognizes the country’s history and the people who came before it in a very personal way, it’s a sign that the sense of community still endures.

Barryville is not the same place it was when Rolf and the boys of Barryville sipped Cherry Cokes at Eckhart’s Store, whistled movies on the not-so-big screen at the Riviera Theater, and read all the comics three times at Traver’s Barber Shop. It must have been a long time since Rolf drove his Volkswagen buggy on the local roads; many Barry villagers probably don’t recognize the name.

For those wishing to pay their respects to a boy who knew only German when he entered Eldred Elementary School, but who served in the U.S. Army, became a distinguished attorney in Washington, D.C., and left behind three loving children and five grandchildren, his family invites you to send greetings and a few dollars to the Eldred Little League in memory of Rolf as a volunteer coach.

He didn’t spend much time on the bench for any of his sports teams, but Rolf’s bluestone bench near his beloved Delaware invites you to spend a few minutes and pay your respects to a great Barryville boy.

Christopher Frey is a 1964 graduate of Eldred Central School, a 1968 graduate of St. John’s University, NY, a former Peace Corps volunteer and retired real estate consultant living in Albany, NY and Longboat Key, FL.