My father was a devout Catholic and enormously proud of his Irish heritage. On September 30, 1995, I learned just how much faith and heritage meant to him. That was the day that two storied football programs, the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, clashed on the gridiron for the first time since 1936.
My father was also a proud Ohio State man. He was born in 1922 and grew up in the hardscrabble farm life of rural southeastern Ohio. Entering adulthood, this kind and gentle farm boy had no aspirations for attending college. Immediately after high school graduation, he moved to the big city of Columbus, Ohio, found a job in a small manufacturing plant, and resided in a low-cost boarding house.
Then came World War II and everything changed. In December 1944, he survived some of the bloodiest initial days of the Battle of the Bulge. Weeks later, Joe McNulty, who began as a private in 1942, received a battlefield commission to the rank of second lieutenant—80 years ago this month. Unfortunately, his service as an officer in the U.S. Army did not last long. In March, he was hit in both legs by sniper fire as his infantry division was steadily advancing towards Berlin. Two years later, this Purple Heart medalist, still recovering from his wounds, enrolled as a business major at THE Ohio State University. But for the war, an enemy’s bullet, and the G.I. Bill, he might never have earned a college degree.
I came along a decade later, the third child of Joe and Bernice McNulty. By the time I knew there was such a thing as college football, I was playing in a basement game room chock-full of Ohio State memorabilia. We wore scarlet and grey, revered Woody Hayes, the long-time, legendary, and complicated coach of my dad’s beloved Buckeyes. And, of course, we did not like that school up north, the University of Michigan.
Then came that football game on the last day of September 1995. I called my Irish Catholic father that morning and said lightheartedly, “Hey, Dad, it must be hard for you to root against Notre Dame today.” To my great surprise, he responded, “Oh, I’m not going to root against Notre Dame. Not a chance.” Wow, my Buckeye-loving father was going to pull for a team against his alma mater!
I was joking, but he was serious.
When I thought about it later, it began to make sense, and it reinforced what I so admired about my dad. He enjoyed following Buckeye football. But experiencing warfare’s death and destruction and laying in a battlefield wondering if you will live or ever walk again, affects a man’s perspective on everything, including competitive sports. We watched hundreds of football and baseball games together, and he never seemed overly disappointed when our team did not win. My dad always kept his priorities straight. Faith and family mattered most.
I lost my dad on Christmas Eve 2003. I will always be enormously thankful for his inspiring character and moral strength. I will not be able to call him on January 20, the day OSU and Notre Dame will battle for the college football national championship, to ask him which team he hopes will win.
I would love to hear his voice, but I know what his answer would be.