NEA/DL Capt. John 'Jack' Richard Fegela

 

 

~ IN MEMORY ~

Military veteran, NEA/DL Capt. John 'Jack' Richard Fegela

October 15, 1940 ~ November 15, 2020

 

From the family of Captain Jack Fegela:  "I am writing to let you know that Jack passed away today (Nov.15). He was 80. Just had a birthday in October. He is in a better place. He was bed ridden and frail."  Captain Fegela first joined Northeast Airlines 12-02-1968 and retired with Delta Air Lines in 2000, based 030/QNY at time of his retirement.  Jack is survived by his wife Ruthi, his sons and his granddaughter.  To date I've not been able to locate an online funeral home obituary but I did find a very nice life story article dated May 5, 2012....please see below. 

Captain Fegela had most recently resided in Effingham NH.  Should more information be received we will be sure to pass it along.

              Thank you,

              ~ Carol for the PCN 

 

 

https://archive.triblive.com/news/time-cant-erase-fegelas-memories/

 

Time can't erase Fegela's memories

Dated  Saturday, May 5, 2012

 

He’s been gone from the area for some 40 years, but Jack Fegela fondly remembers growing up in the Charleroi area as though it were yesterday.

 

“Those were great years and I still cherish them dearly,” said Fegela, of Strafford, N.H., near Portsmouth. “How could anyone who grew up in the (Mon) Valley ever forget being there?”

 

Fegela, the son of the late John and Mary Ellen Fegela, lived in Carroll Township, near Monongahela Valley Country Club, and is a 1958 graduate of Charleroi High School. He attended California State Teachers College and earned his degree in 1954.

 

“My mother was from Monessen, and her maiden name was Sherwin,” Fegela said. “I remember her telling me she knew Stan Musial, the baseball player from Donora. I always thought that was neat. She worked in the office at the U.S. Steel plant at Dravosburg. My dad was an electrician and worked at the Allenport plant of Pittsburgh Steel Co.”

 

Fegela’s aunt, Elizabeth (Betty) Culler, was a bookkeeper for many years at The Charleroi Mail, and his aunt and uncle, the late George and Ida Fegela, also lived in Charleroi.

 

“Both of them were golf champions at Mon Valley Country Club,” he said of George and Ida Fegela. “Uncle George was the guy who did those great train displays at Christmastime in the department store (Collins) next to Wolf’s Clothing store. People used to stand in front of those large windows on McKean Avenue and watch the trains go round and round. My aunt and uncle also did photography for the high school kids for a number of years, senior pictures and so forth.”

 

Fegela, a retired Delta Airlines pilot, also has a half sister, Gail Lynn Fegela Waham, who now lives in Cincinnati. She is a graduate of Monongahela Valley Catholic High School.

 

“I haven’t been back to the area for several years, so I’m not sure how many relatives are still around,” Fegela said. “I know we were related to the Mazanetz family who live near 10th Street and the Dzurinko family from Lock Four.”

 

Fegela says he was a “typical teenager growing up in the ’50s.”

 

“We were always cruisin’ somewhere in the Valley, going to dances at places like the Jumpin’ Jive Bee Hive and other canteens in the area,” he said. “That was the beginning of rock ‘n’ roll, and we enjoyed it so much. I remember swimming and boating in the Monongahela River, the great old-timers who lived near the old streetcar barn on McKean Avenue, roller skating, terrific ethnic food, Stetz pop, Lock Four hill and having friends in every town in the Valley, places like Donora, Monongahela, Stockdale, Dunlevy, Allenport and California.”

 

Also lingering in Fegela’s memory bank are “fizzy drinks” at Geezer’s Drug Store, the long walk up Fifth Street to Charleroi High School, sled riding down 10th Street, and Ss. Cyril and Methodius School.

 

“And I’ll never forget working at Wolf’s Clothing store my last two years of college,” Fegela said. “The Wolf brothers, Harry and Ed, were great guys.”

 

Another vivid memory was created in the fall of 1962 when Fegela did his student teaching at Donora High School.

 

“I taught 11th-grade English and had a great time there,” he smiled. “I remember a very bright, well-spoken and well-dressed black girl who sat in the front row. Her name was Rochella Dixon. About 10 years ago, I was watching my newly adopted football team, the New England Patriots, and it was the first home game of the season. They were introducing a rookie running back who went to Pitt named Curtis Martin and the TV cameras panned the crowd and showed his mother in the stands. The announcer said her name was Rochella. Well, I’ve only met one Rochella in my life and there she was. Curtis Martin is her son.”

 

Although he earned a teaching degree from California, Fegela’s career decisions were altered because of a military obligation.

 

“I took my first airplane ride when I was 5 years old at Deep Creek, Md., and I loved it,” Fegela said. “Maybe that stuck with me, I’m not sure. But I joined the Navy Reserve when I was in college so I didn’t get drafted into the Army and I had to go on active duty for two years after graduation. I had the opportunity to go to officer candidate school but declined because it would have added two more years to my military commitment.”

 

As an enlisted man, Fegela became a Navy photojournalist and was assigned to a ship in the Mediterranean Sea during the Vietnam War.

 

“About six months before my Navy hitch was up, I got transferred from that ship to the Jacksonville Navy Air Station in Florida and became a speech writer for the base admiral,” Fegela said. “There was a Navy flying club there, and I learned to fly and got a private pilot’s license.”

 

After his discharge from the Navy, Fegela moved to Fort Lauderdale and worked in general aviation before obtaining a commercial pilot’s license and an instrument rating. He built his flying hours by piloting charter flights and also working for a small oil company, delivering parts to their gas stations throughout Florida. In 1967, he moved to New Jersey and took a course for a flight engineer’s license.

 

“I kept applying to all of the airlines because I met all of their qualifications — flying hours, honorable military discharge, commercial pilot’s license, instrument rating,” he said. “And I had passed the flight engineer FAA written exam. I was finally hired as a pilot by Northeast Airlines and started my training in December 1968. In 1970, Northeast and Delta merged, and I flew as flight engineer, then copilot and finally as captain before retiring from Delta at the FAA mandatory retirement age of 60 in October of 2000.”

 

Fegela was married for 36 years to the former Elizabeth Nichols Underhill, of East Orange, N.J., an accomplished pianist and gourmet cook. She died at age 59 on May 23, 2003, after a long battle with cancer. The couple had two sons, Christopher Sears Fegela and Michael Major Fegela.

 

Christopher, 33, lives in Cape Cod, Mass., and works as a computer engineer at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. He is the father of Jack’s only grandchild, Nadia Elizabeth Fegela. Michael, 29, is a construction foreman in Santa Cruz, Calif.

 

“They’re both great kids,” Fegela said. “I’m very proud of them.”

 

Retirement has been filled with anything but slowing down for Fegela, who has remarried. He and his wife, Ruth, live in “the New Hampshire woods with tons of deer, wild turkey, moose and bears who feel confident enough to walk through the driveway and hang out around our house,” he said.

 

In 2004 Fegela was his own general contractor and built a state-of-the-art passive solar, log envelope house, which became a model home for the Log Home Company in North Carolina.

 

“You can see it being built at www.enertia.com,” Fegela said. “Their site also explains the concept of an envelope house.”

 

Fegela also remains an avid car buff and has several, including a 1973 Jeep Scrambler, a 1978 Volkswagen Bug Champagne II Edition convertible, two super-customized Chrysler PT Cruisers and a fun side-by-side RUV, a Yamaha Rhino 660 that he and his wife ride in the woods and use for yard work and property maintenance.

 

“The VW has about 20,000 miles on it now, and it only comes out on sunny days,” Fegela said, laughing.

 

As if that weren’t enough to keep him busy, Fegela also enjoys his guns and does a lot of target shooting. And he likes to cook.

 

“I’m a master of deep frying turkeys and started doing it about 10 years before Martha Stewart ever heard of it and then made it the biggest thing since sliced bread,” Fegela said.

 

Food also plays an important role in Fegela’s memories of life in Charleroi and the Mon Valley.

 

“I remember very vividly having my mother take me to Rego’s restaurant,” he said. “I’m talking about the very old place, the original one. As you walked in there was a long bar on the right and booths to the left. The fried shrimp and cocktail sauce that I used to get there made such an impression on my young pallet that I never forgot it. The fried shrimp from Rego’s is still the benchmark, and subconsciously I measure any that I have now by that standard.”