RIP: Everett M. (Bud) Burchell

1927-2024

My Uncle Bud (Everett M. Burchell) was as good a man as I have ever known. Intelligent, kind, generous, humerous, mischievous, open-hearted, and honorable. He made me proud to share the same family name. I told him so. He and his widow were both educators; she a kindergarten teacher and he a High School principal. He served in the US Navy (submariner) in WWII. He was a master freemason and part of the reason that I became one. He was the first in our family to obtain a professional doctorate (EdD) and I am the first to obtain an academic one (PhD History).

You’ll see him on the left in the photo taken at my graduation. That’s his brother, my dad, on the right. Bud passed away today. He was 97 years old. The world is a richer place because he lived in it and a distinctly darker place now that he’s gone.

I have a mixture of feelings. On the one hand, his departure leaves a hole in my life; in all our lives. On the other, I’m relieved that he will no longer puzzle and shake his head over how terribly wrong “things” have gone with the world. He was by nature an optimistic and patriotic man, but in recent years he ahared with me his growing dismay and disappointment at the dishonorable and unfortunate turns taken by our country.