Lansing author brings Myers and local heroes to life in ‘Home Fields’

Author Bill George’s “Home Fields,” a story about caring for a dying man, raising a family and leading young athletes and military members on the gridiron and in life, highlights life in Myers, a hamlet in the southwest of Lansing. 

The book follows the stories of four people and their upbringing, all connected by Myers, based on the stories told by George’s father Casper. Around 2014, after Casper moved into Bill’s home, he started retelling stories of his childhood to Bill and his at-the-time four year-old daughter. Those stories inspired Bill to overcome the obstacles of daily life as the head coach of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy football team, to be a better father — a role he had just adopted for the first time in his 50s — and to reflect and write about the brevity of life and the opportunities it presents.

In his twilight years, Casper shared fascinating childhood stories of growing up in Myers during World War II, which at the time was a village populated by Syrian refugees, Bill said. Bill’s memoir starts in 1935. 

“I wrote about these tragic lives and how life can be so short,” Bill said. “At night as we’re taking care of [Casper] and he’s dying, he’s reminiscing on his childhood, and he has this little girl that he’s talking to at night.”

Sandwiched between and interwoven in Bill’s family narrative are passages of the upbringing of the four characters in Myers, their coming-of-age moments and the instances of clarity and wonder in a world that at the time was radically changing by the minute. 

“They grew up innocently, and they tried to grow up as just you and I grew up,” Bill said. “Suddenly, they just aren’t appearing on the main stage of life.”

One of the book’s characters is George “Gus” Isaac, a highly decorated veteran and a longtime resident of Lansing, who also features prominently in the last third of the book, Bill said. Isaac received a Purple Heart medal for his military service, a highly prestigious military decoration awarded in the name of the president to those wounded or killed while serving.

Isaac, who is 100 years old, was born in 1923 and raised in Lansing on Myers Heights Road, also known as Syrian Hill. He is a Lansing High School alumnus and was drafted into the U.S. Army on Jan. 7, 1943. He was a corporal with Company L, 30th Infantry, and served during World War II in nine countries in northern Africa and Europe.

“He told me: ‘I didn’t even watch TV. I didn’t even have a car. I never left Myers, and suddenly, I’m shipped across the sea and I’m in South Africa and I have to ship over to Italy,’” Bill said, recounting his conversations with Isaac.

Another key character in Bill’s story is Myers itself, particularly Syrian Hill, where Syrian refugees built a new community, and the International Salt Plant, now defunct. After a recent trip to Myers, Bill reflected on what he sees in that area today.

“How I see it now — it’s a small, quiet town,” Bill said. “I see it as probably like a lot of little immigrant villages. The people pass away. In many ways, I see it as sad because all the relatives I knew are gone.”

Ultimately, Bill said he wants readers to remember the value of life.

“Life is very short, and for some people it’s so much shorter,” he noted. “We all have dreams, and some people’s dreams come true. Some people don’t have the opportunity to chase their dreams for very long in this life.”

In brief:

Caregiver and child yoga at the Lansing Community Library

The library will host weekly yoga classes for caregivers and children every Wednesday through the end of May at 1 p.m. The sessions will be hosted by talented yoga instructor Stephanie Mulinos.

Lansing blood drive

The Lansing Town Hall will host the Lansing Community Blood Drive May 24 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in partnership with The American Red Cross. 

Spring rabies vaccination clinic

Tompkins County Whole Health’s Environmental Health Division will host a no-cost rabies vaccination clinic May 23 at the Enfield Highway Garage on Enfield Main Road in Ithaca from 7 to 9 p.mChip Wood (left) is the new pastor of West Groton Bible Church. He and his wife, Karen (right), were graciously welcomed by the congregation last month, following a long stretch without a permanent pastor to fill the pulpit..