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Barbara and Jack Ewald cut the cake at their wedding on June 16, 1962, with flower girl Cheryl Cernitch to the right. (Submitted photo / October 6, 2012) |
John “Jack” Ewald’s life was full of interesting coincidences and connections through his work as a Methodist pastor and his community involvement.
There were many times when things seemed to come full circle, said his wife, Barbara Ewald.
Things such as Jack’s connection to Hagerstown. He was born in Hagerstown and lived there for the first decades of his life, later served the congregation of St. Andrew’s United Methodist Church at two different times, then returned to Hagerstown three years ago.
Two of the Ewalds’ children were born in Hagerstown.
Jack was baptized at John Wesley United Methodist Church, where his family was involved, as they were in every church they attended, Barbara said.
The only child of Edward and Anna Ewald, Jack and his parents moved to Cumberland, Md., for Edward’s job with Potomac Edison when Jack was 10. Jack met Barbara Cross, who was a year younger, during his senior year of high school.
They went to rival high schools — Jack to Allegany High School and Barbara to Fort Hill High School. Both attended what then was Frostburg State College. Barbara put her career on hold and earned her bachelor’s degree in education as a full-time student at the University of Maryland, College Park in 1976.
She said it was their youth pastor who thought they would “make a good team” and started setting up situations through which they would meet. His intuition was correct.
“I can’t imagine a better match for either of us,” Barbara said.
In 1962, five years after they met, they married. Jack completed his bachelor’s degree at American University in Washington, D.C., and graduated from Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington.
Jack and Barbara celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in June in Rehoboth Beach, Del., with their three children and six grandchildren. While the children were growing up, summer vacation always meant a trip to Myrtle Beach, S.C.
“Mom and Dad taught me to be a beach bum. A day at the beach meant when the sun rose, we’d put our feet in the sand and we didn’t leave until the sun set,” said oldest child John D. Ewald of Fulton, Md.
The anniversary celebration had extra meaning for the family because Jack had been diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia about 10 years ago, while Jack was serving his last parish in Potomac, Md., near Washington. The diagnosis was “kind of a shock,” Barbara said, coming not long after Jack’s 60th birthday.
“His motto was to live life as if he were perfectly healthy and he did a good job of that,” Barbara said. “We got a lot out of those years.”
Jack’s leukemia progressed and his health began failing rapidly in the last year and a half.
“We were able to go to the beach one last time. It was his favorite spot,” Barbara said. “On his Facebook posting, he wrote that he didn’t feel like he was sick. He kept himself together for that, then he went downhill after that.”
Jack’s ministry took the couple, and later their family, to different parishes in Maryland, including Flintstone, Hagerstown, Hyattsville, Mount Airy and Potomac. He retired in 2006 after nearly 50 years of ministry.
Social justice issues were a hallmark of Jack’s ministry. In the late 1960s, while at St. Andrew’s in Hagerstown, he was instrumental in the founding of the Community Action Council, Barbara said.
Through his involvement in CAC, he had lots of meetings, visited families in trouble and took groceries to those in need, in addition to his parish responsibilities, Barbara said.
There were many times when things seemed to come full circle, said his wife, Barbara Ewald.
Things such as Jack’s connection to Hagerstown. He was born in Hagerstown and lived there for the first decades of his life, later served the congregation of St. Andrew’s United Methodist Church at two different times, then returned to Hagerstown three years ago.
Two of the Ewalds’ children were born in Hagerstown.
Jack was baptized at John Wesley United Methodist Church, where his family was involved, as they were in every church they attended, Barbara said.
The only child of Edward and Anna Ewald, Jack and his parents moved to Cumberland, Md., for Edward’s job with Potomac Edison when Jack was 10. Jack met Barbara Cross, who was a year younger, during his senior year of high school.
They went to rival high schools — Jack to Allegany High School and Barbara to Fort Hill High School. Both attended what then was Frostburg State College. Barbara put her career on hold and earned her bachelor’s degree in education as a full-time student at the University of Maryland, College Park in 1976.
She said it was their youth pastor who thought they would “make a good team” and started setting up situations through which they would meet. His intuition was correct.
“I can’t imagine a better match for either of us,” Barbara said.
In 1962, five years after they met, they married. Jack completed his bachelor’s degree at American University in Washington, D.C., and graduated from Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington.
Jack and Barbara celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in June in Rehoboth Beach, Del., with their three children and six grandchildren. While the children were growing up, summer vacation always meant a trip to Myrtle Beach, S.C.
“Mom and Dad taught me to be a beach bum. A day at the beach meant when the sun rose, we’d put our feet in the sand and we didn’t leave until the sun set,” said oldest child John D. Ewald of Fulton, Md.
The anniversary celebration had extra meaning for the family because Jack had been diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia about 10 years ago, while Jack was serving his last parish in Potomac, Md., near Washington. The diagnosis was “kind of a shock,” Barbara said, coming not long after Jack’s 60th birthday.
“His motto was to live life as if he were perfectly healthy and he did a good job of that,” Barbara said. “We got a lot out of those years.”
Jack’s leukemia progressed and his health began failing rapidly in the last year and a half.
“We were able to go to the beach one last time. It was his favorite spot,” Barbara said. “On his Facebook posting, he wrote that he didn’t feel like he was sick. He kept himself together for that, then he went downhill after that.”
Jack’s ministry took the couple, and later their family, to different parishes in Maryland, including Flintstone, Hagerstown, Hyattsville, Mount Airy and Potomac. He retired in 2006 after nearly 50 years of ministry.
Social justice issues were a hallmark of Jack’s ministry. In the late 1960s, while at St. Andrew’s in Hagerstown, he was instrumental in the founding of the Community Action Council, Barbara said.
Through his involvement in CAC, he had lots of meetings, visited families in trouble and took groceries to those in need, in addition to his parish responsibilities, Barbara said.
