Still I think of his laugh. I think of his tennis shoes. I think of him helping me build a race car out of a mousetrap. I think of the day as a child when he took me north, near the small North Dakota town where he was born, and we spent the afternoon searching for arrowheads in farmer’s fields.

And his presence at the head of a table, and his command of the dishwashing post-meal. The blocky, font-like handwriting on his notes and blueprints and the way his Levi’s fit.

Twenty years gone today, this man I love and miss deeply.

Edmond Chester Leonard
29 May 1935 — 27 December 2003

On Greene Avenue, Brooklyn

Mom and Calder at the Whitney

Home of the fastest street car.
Philadelphia, PA

Illustration by Pierre Buttin