Tuesday, 3/6

Even though he died a couple of decades before I was born, I've always kind of considered Charlie Pong a friend.

During last Friday's blog about Phil I quoted a newspaper article written about another downtown Marquette “man about town” named Charlie Pong, and I've had several people ask about him. I checked back, and it doesn't look like I've written much about him in here over the years.

That all changes now.

Charlie Pong was a very popular business owner in Marquette in the first half of the 20^th century. He had a Chinese laundry (yes, those actually did exist) at several locations in the city, most notably where the parking lot on Washington Street across from where the post office now sits. He came to the U.S. In the 1910s to work with his cousin Pong Lee, who had opened the laundry and needed someone to take it over. And take it over Charlie did, running it for several decades and becoming a much beloved member of the Marquette business community.

Now, here's the thing about Charlie Pong. Over the decades, any money that he made in his business he sent back to family in China, so even though he was the successful business owner, when he died in 1949 he was penniless. In fact, because he left no money for a funeral or a burial, he was slated to be buried in Potter’s Field at Park Cemetery. When his fellow downtown business owners found out about that, they all pitched in and bought him a burial plot and a headstone to go along with it.

That's how beloved Charlie Pong was.

He was buried under a pine tree, and like all pine trees it leaks onto Charlie's headstone. So once a year I go over and clean it off. Sure, it might be a dorky thing to do (like many things I do) but it's something I enjoy doing. Not only am I paying tribute to a Marquette icon, but I'd like to think I'm just carrying on a tradition started by those business owners who collected money for his grave almost 70 years ago.

And you know what? I don't think I'm the only one. This hasn't happened every year, but there have been several years where someone puts plastic flowers on his grave. Seriously, they do. I have no idea who puts the flowers there. I can’t imagine that after seven decades there’s still someone from that group of business owners around, although stranger things have happened. But who knows. . .maybe a child of one of the business owners remembers hearing the stories dad told about Mr. Pong, and decided to keep the tradition going. That would make sense. Of course, it would also make sense that there’s someone else, someone like me, just an individual who heard the stories about Charlie and decided to mark his life and his contribution to Marquette with flowers instead of a clean headstone.

All I know is that the flowers do keep appearing. Not every year, but they still keep appearing.

That's the story of my “friend” Charlie Pong. Now you know.

(jim@wmqt.com)