Robert Kirkbride lived in Vermont for his entire 93 years, except when he was serving overseas. He was born in Burlington in 1926, served in Japan in World War II, and later joined the Air Force to serve in the Korean War. He also served as a Burlington police officer before moving in 1952 to his wife’s hometown of Ludlow, where he lived and worked for the next 68 years. Kirkbride’s daughter Deborah Khiel said he brought a military precision to everything he did.
Deborah Khiel: I remember he used to wash my hair when I was a little kid. I don’t know why, I guess mom just used to have dad wash our hair in the sink when we needed to wash it. He would use the tips of his fingers, and we’d be squeaky clean.
He was so proud of his lawn. Oh my god, it was a golf course. He was snow blowing up until this winter. I was up there every month and he was out on a snow blower. He’d do everybody else’s yard and ours.
He ironed his undershirts. Everything had to be pressed and perfect. He took great pride. He was colorblind, but he did a heck of a good job of coordinating his socks and pants and shirts and ties.
His dad passed away when he was 3; he really didn’t know his dad. His dad was a jeweler in Burlington. He had aunts and uncles who took him under their wings. I know one of his aunts had a hat shop, and he used to clean it.
Attention to detail. Meticulous record keeping. Right to the penny, he would balance his checkbook. The notes he would take, oh my god. He went to the Town Meeting in Ludlow two weeks before he passed. And I happened to find the minutes — you know, the booklet about what they’re going to talk about. He had made notes in the margin, questions to ask, or things that people said during the meeting. It was quite the record.
In February 2019, Kirkbride’s son, also named Bob, died by suicide. Seven months later, his wife Patricia died of natural causes.
Deborah Khiel: He’s a whistler. Whenever he was in a good place, he would whistle. He would whistle “Yankee Doodle”, or “Star Spangled Banner” — just patriotic songs. He loved listening to old music. For a while after my brother’s death, and after my mother’s death, he didn’t whistle. And then one weekend when I was home, he was whistling. I was like, that’s a good sign.
My dad was just so lonely after my mom passed. When he and my mom got married in 1952, he moved from Burlington, where he grew up, to Ludlow, to be where my mom grew up. They had a different home in Ludlow, and then he bought the one that he had lived in up until he entered the hospital on March 11.
My mom’s family [was a] big family in town. My grandfather had a small oil business, which my father joined after my grandfather died. He was really accepted and welcomed there because he was just such a nice, honest man. Hardworking. I think people respected that and saw that in him from the very beginning.
He made Ludlow his home and quickly became involved in the Rotary — very, very dedicated member of the Rotary, the Knights of Columbus and the fire department. He never, never missed a meeting.
[He was] a very devout Catholic. He was pretty much raised by his mom and his sisters. They lived close to the Catholic Church there in Burlington. He was an altar boy, and cleaned the church, and did errands for the priests, and pretty much went to church all the time.
He would pray. I can just remember as kids, whenever we went on vacation to a relative’s house, we’d always have to say the Rosary. Always. We’re like, “oh boy, here we go.” Saying the Rosary, always saying prayers, going to church, going to Sunday school — bringing us up with that faith. I’m thankful now that I was brought up that way, because with the losses that I’ve endured in the last 13 months, I think it helped me get through them for sure.
He didn’t have any symptoms, really, that would make them think that he even had Covid-19. He didn’t have a fever, he didn’t have a cough. He went in [to the VA Medical Center in White River Junction] just not feeling good, and they put them in a regular room. He went on Wednesday afternoon, the 11th.
My sister came over from Maine. I was going up anyway to see him that weekend. And then we found out he was put into isolation on Thursday night because his temperature got so high. Then the doctor called us up Friday night around midnight and said that he had tested positive for the coronavirus. We were both just speechless. Shocked. It was just like, “oh my god, how could this be happening?”
The hard part was not being able to be there with him. But we had made clear to them, we wanted a priest to go pray with him. We wanted a priest to bring a Rosary, because we couldn’t. And then as things started turning around and didn’t sound good, we just did not want him to die alone. The VA reassured us that he would not. They just said, our veterans do not die alone.
This wonderful woman there in the tech department, she had her iPad and phone. We could see him, but he was sedated. He was intubated. We prayed, we whistled, and then it was getting closer to him passing. So she just stayed on the phone with us. She said that his doctor was on one side of him, holding one hand, and his nurse was on the other, holding his other hand. And she stayed on the line with us right up until after he passed.
I just know that he’s with mom. He missed her. They cut his ring off, his wedding band, because he started retaining fluids at the hospital. And I said, oh my god, that ring probably had never been off his finger since they got married in 1952. I was like, “don’t lose that ring.” And one of the nurses or somebody said, “we’re going to tape it right above his heart.”
Robert Kirkbride died at the VA Medical Center in White River Junction on March 19, 2020. He was 93 years old.
—As told to Mike Dougherty
Read more remembrances of Vermonters lost to the coronavirus.
