John Bartlett – “The Johnny B. Fund”
This project originated as the “Johnny B.” Fund when John Bartlett passed away suddenly in 1994 at the too young age of 34.
“I don’t want to say he was a loser magnet, but he would befriend people that others would shy away from,” Eric Leighton once said. ”A happy dude, you know? Always a big grin on his face.”
He also would record himself playing Christmas songs on his reel-to-reel four-track and distribute the tapes during the holiday season. Another hobby was photography, and he always would keep a camera in his truck in case an eye-catching bird came around.
“His funeral was at Galbreath Chapel, and when it was over, when everyone was leaving and spilling out into the area behind the chapel, this Red Tailed Hawk came screaming in and landed in a sycamore tree,” Leighton remembered. “It was making all kinds of noise, and in my mind, I thought, ‘Well, there he is.’ That was just in my mind, but several years later I saw his widow, and we got to talking about it. She said her youngest son, who was about 2 at the time, had noticed it, too. And when that hawk came flying in, he had said, “There’s Daddy.”
