By Steve Flairty
NKyTribune Columnist
Within the last few weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting with two different people in Boone County to discuss their amazing acts of kindness carried out over many years. Each will be included in my fifth volume of the Kentucky’s Everyday Heroes series.
I wrote about Sister Juana Mendez in a recent column, a member of the Diocese of Covington a long-time and effective supporter of Hispanic immigrants in the area. She works tenaciously to help those seeking their green cards and who need assistance in navigating life in a different environment. We met for an interview at her Cristo Rey Parish office, just off Turfway Road in Florence.
Jackie Kaye (Photo by Steve Flairty)
Last week, about a mile from there across I-75 at the Hilton Airport Hotel, I met a remarkable 86-year-old with the young-sounding name of Jackie Kaye. Someone in the Rotary had given me a lead on the individual as being a remarkable story to follow. On that day at the hotel banquet room, the Florence Rotary Club was honoring her as their “Citizen of the Year,” and it was easy to see why.
Club member and former winner of the award Gary Greisser nominated Jackie after “discovering” her and her work at the post office in the nearby town of Burlington. While standing in line, Gary noticed a large number of packages being shipped and the consequent attention given by the post office staff to a senior citizen woman sending them. When it came Gary’s turn to be served, he asked the clerk, with keen curiosity, about the interesting customer he had witnessed.
“Oh, that’s ‘Mom’. . .Mom Kaye,” said the clerk, “and she sends packages to people in the Navy — all the time.”
Gary, also long an advocate for American military service veterans, eagerly approached Jackie Kaye about his interest in her work. In time, the two met her at her Burlington home for an informal interview about her 50-year project and to see her huge collection of naval memorabilia accumulated over those five decades. He learned a great deal in the time together. It proved enlightening, and Gary couldn’t wait to make others aware of Jackie Kaye’s story.
That’s when he wrote a nomination letter to the Rotary outlining Jackie’s and her late husband, Norman’s, amazing dedication of support to the naval service and especially those on submarines. While living on the inter-coastal waterway at Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, “Mom and Pop” Kaye adopted Navy crews of ships that came near shore. Gary wrote that the couple “opened up their home while the sailors were in port…(and) could stay with them as they enjoyed home-cooked meals, relaxing by the pool, and (enjoyed) gift boxes of sundries provided by local merchants.”
Gary Greisser
They also sent care packages to sailors on holidays, with numbers as high as 150 to 200 per ship. There were movie and baseball tickets, shows and other activities provided by the two both enlisted and officers.
Starting in 1991, according to Gary’s findings, the emphasis of service shifted to mostly submarine forces, warships, and a few marine platoons. Norman died in 2001, a very able partner in the endeavor. But even now at age 86, “Mom” Kaye is quite active in her outreach. She still sends care packages and keeps in touch with friendships forged over years of interactions with those connected to the U.S. Navy; she has kept in her possession thousands of letters of appreciation.
She’s helped to commission and decommission ships, worked with the Turkish-American Business Education and Culture Development program, and is given credit by naval astronaut Dr. Jim Reilly for encouraging his joining the Navy and later flying as an astronaut. Businesses have seen her heart and good works and have responded with large donations in support.
The audience at the Rotary meeting included several with duty time spent involving submarines. I had a chance to speak to Jim Preston, who traveled from Connecticut to be at the honoring of Jackie. “I met Jackie Kaye in Ft. Lauderdale when her and her husband adopted the Boston (American submarine named for the city). They were terrific,” he said. “They rented a hotel room for two weeks for guys to come and visit.” He also commented on how the couple courageously stood up for Jim’s crewmates when the city of Boston, they believed, shunned them because of the vessel’s nuclear weapons. On this day, nearly in tears, he simply called Jackie “a great woman.”
Currently, Jackie is serving her third generation of naval personnel, and Gary added that “some of her current sailors are grandchildren of her original crews.” Demonstrating further her passionate resolve to lift up all the military services, she burns a perpetual candle in her home.
Mom Kaye and I have made plans to meet soon to discuss many more details of her life and work for the book. Of over a hundred individuals profiled in the Kentucky’s Everyday Heroes series, her story will undoubtedly be one of the most compelling.
It’s admirable that Boone County produces such special people like Sister Mendez and Mom Kaye. I suspect there are more in this Northern Kentucky community.
One of my favorite Kentucky towns is a short drive on the Bluegrass Parkway, “touristy” and quaint Bardstown.
Most anybody familiar with Bardstown knows, one of its features is the distilled spirits industry.
There was a time, back in the mid-1800s, however, when some local citizens wanted booze banned despite its economic benefit to the area, and thus Prohibition came on the scene. There soon came a serious backlash, however, and ironically it came from some pretty unexpected sources.
In their historical book, Prohibition in Bardstown: Bourbon, Bootlegging & Saloons (History Press, 2016), Doris Settles and Dixie Hibbs tell readers about such colorful Prohibition fighters such as 70-year-old Aunt Be-At Hurst, who made booze in her bathtub, along with a Baptist deacon who kept moonshine in the baptistery.
The book can be found on Amazon.com or ordered directly from author Doris Settles via email doris@dorissettles.com.
Steve Flairty is a teacher, public speaker and an author of six books: a biography of Kentucky Afield host Tim Farmer and five in the Kentucky’s Everyday Heroes series, including a kids’ version. Steve’s “Kentucky’s Everyday Heroes #4,” was released in 2015. Steve is a senior correspondent for Kentucky Monthly, a weekly KyForward and NKyTribune columnist and a member of the Kentucky Humanities Council Speakers Bureau. Contact him at sflairty2001@yahoo.com or visit his Facebook page, “Kentucky in Common: Word Sketches in Tribute.” (Steve’s photo by Connie McDonald)
